


The Moon Above

by climbingvines



Category: Kpop - Fandom, iKON (Korea Band), 방탄소년단 | Bangtan Boys | BTS
Genre: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alternate Universe - Dystopia, Alternate Universe - Post-Apocalypse, Alternate Universe - Science Fiction, Arranged Marriage, Childbirth, Emotional Infidelity, Forced Servitude, Graphic Depictions of Illness, Implied Mpreg, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Jealousy, Knotting, M/M, Mating Bites, Mating Bond, Mating Cycles/In Heat, Mating Rituals, Medical Procedures, Mpreg, Multi, Mutants?, Polyamory, Pregnancy, Pseudoscience, Shapeshifting, Slavery, Takes Place over SEVERAL years so please be patient when it comes to some of the relationship tags, Zombies, also don't skip chapters that aren't about your group you'll miss out on important info aksdjakjds, also if you're not a fan of both groups pls give it a try I promise if you might like it, depictions of combat, will add more tags as they come up
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-05-08
Updated: 2020-02-01
Packaged: 2020-02-28 09:51:19
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 7
Words: 67,542
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18754006
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/climbingvines/pseuds/climbingvines
Summary: OUR STORY BEGINS IN 2395, ninety-five years after the imposition of the MATCH program and one-hundred and five years after the Taliians separated from the Walls. The Wolfolk have been resisting the Committees attempts to bring them into the fold for the past seventy-five years, but things are beginning to come to a head on that front. The Committee is currently lead by Kim Jinsun, a cold and calculating Alpha whose ruthless pursuit of the Wolfolk and whose crack down on those who would avoid the MATCH Program is beginning to stir feelings of dissent in the general population.On Saeloun, the Shore Pack- the oldest and most powerful of the Taliian settlements- is lead by Alpha Bang Shihyuk while high in the mountains the Village of Sangil rots from the inside out.In the ruins of Old Gwangju the Alpha of the Jung Pack has passed away, leaving his young son Hoseok to lead in his place.And a young beta runs from it all.





	1. A Primer to End All Primers

**Author's Note:**

> PLS BE ADVISED: THIS FIRST CHAPTER IS SIMPLY A PRIMER TO GIVE YOU A BASIC UNDERSTANDING OF THE HISTORY BEHIND THIS WORLD AND THE DIFFERENT WAYS THAT PEOPLE HAVE FOUND TO SURVIVE, AS WELL AS TO GIVE YOU AN UNDERSTANDING OF HOW THE ABO ASPECTS OF THIS FIC FUNCTION AND HOW THE DIFFERENT UNIQUE ABILITIES SOME CHARACTER WILL HAVE FACTOR IN.
> 
> THE FIRST TRUE CHAPTER WILL BE POSTED SOME TIME THIS WEEK IF ALL THINGS GO ACCORDING TO PLAN. 
> 
> ENJOY!
> 
> \- Vinnie <3
> 
> PSA: I did a lot of research but I also have no idea what I'm talking about, so while all of this sounds very scientific please don't come at me like 'uhhhh that's not how any of that works' because I know I'm just gonna be sitting over here doing that 'fuuuutuuurrreee' thing from Spongebob lol. Also I will make any kinds of spelling error edits in a few days when it's not 3:00am and my eyeballs function again.

**THE DESOLATION: A BRIEF HISTORY**

 

In the year 2100 a star in the Vela Constellation known as Velorum A went supernova.

Part of the Gamma Velorum star system; the star was actually a spectroscopic binary star- two stars that appear as a single point of light when viewed from a great distance; often shifting between blue and red in color. It consisted of a blue supergiant and a red wolf rayet star. The wolf rayet star ended its life in a Type IC Supernova, a kind of supernova in which the core of the star has been stripped of its outer layer of hydrogen and most of its helium shell. A supernova is an astronomical event that occurs during the last stellar evolutionary stages of a massive star's life; a dramatic and catastrophic destruction marked by one final titanic explosion. In wolf rayet stars, the loss of the protective outer shell can occur suddenly and the rapid expansion of the inner gases results in the far flinging of materials away from the star. This drives a fast moving shockwave into the surrounding interstellar medium.

In the case of Velorum A, the shockwave drove that celestial detritus from the core of the wolf rayet star into the heart of its neighboring blue supergiant. The supergiant absorbed all that it could, but the resulting build up of energy resulted in the supergiant going supernova as well, not long after the wolf rayet.

The inevitable consequence of these cosmic events was a high dose of gamma radiation that travelled the 840 light years across space to eventually collide with a planet called Earth, burning away a significant portion of its atmosphere, destroying electrical grids, downing planes, and essentially grinding the civilizations that lived there to a resounding halt. This initial event, called the Desolation, marked the beginning of the end for humanity as they knew it.

In the weeks after the radiation hit, the death toll topped ten million and showed no signs of abating. Despite extreme precautions, even the rich and powerful proved to be just as susceptible to the cosmic onslaught as the homeless, the panicked, the reckless, and the everyday citizen. In the months to come, the radiation poisoning left more this sixty percent of world leaders dead or dying, along with more than a billion others worldwide. With the government in chaos, fear of anarchy and terrorism followed in its wake. But the terrorists were as busy dying as everyone else.

Urban areas became war zones, with thinning police forces fighting against survivors who looked at the end of humanity as an opportunity for blood, brutality, or profit. Commercial air travel shut down almost immediately, planes that hadn’t crash during the intial electrical surges left abandoned on the runways with no one left to fly them. People tried to outrun what they couldn’t even see, leaving their homes, their cities, even their countries, only to die elsewhere. Others opted to ride the death and destruction out, stockpiling supplies in their homes and apartments- even their office buildings, locking doors and windows, guarding against an enemy that was literally in the air around them. They had all the comforts of dying in their own beds.

Those who locked themselves in and managed to survive clung to sporadic news coverage hoping for a miracle. It wasn’t long until even that was gone, and the Earth fell silent.

The gamma ray burst, over time, caused a series of chemical reaction in Earth’s atmosphere; mostly involving oxygen and nitrogen molecules. Creating first nitrogen oxide and then nitrogen dioxide, the affecting the planet threefold. This depletion of the ozone layer by up to 75% in some areas of the world would last for years to come. This reduction of protective atmosphere dangerously elevated the UV index levels on the surface. Those who survived the initial breakdown of civilization soon succumbed to a bevy of radiation based illnesses.

The nitrogen oxide produced by the depletion of the ozone layer eventually created a sort of photochemical smog which darkened the sky and blocked out parts of the sunlight spectrum. While this helped reduce the amount of people dying from UV exposure, it also affected photosynthesis on the surface, causing a sharp drop in plantlife. The smog also cooled the Earth’s surface, affecting its climate and producing a cosmic winter, a period of prolonged cold weather caused by a devastating loss of life in the form of plants and animals that relied on the process of photosynthesis to survive. The lack of food lead to the mass extinction of other animals higher up on the food chain that relied on those plants eating animals to survive. Ultimately, a further 25% of the remaining human population perished from lack of food.

In the remaining human population, the gamma ray burst along with prolonged exposure to ultraviolet radiation acted as a rapid mutagen, creating sudden changes in the brain’s neurological processes. As a result, individuals began to develop preternatural abilities. Dubbed the Vela Effect, these ‘powers’ often took the form of psychic abilities. Common powers included the ability to manipulate weather or encourage plant growth, all of which came in handy when the cosmic winter finally came to an end. Individuals with these gifts were called the Touched and were instrumental in securing humanity’s survival and future in the days after the Desolation.

Even with the psychic advantage, population levels were stagnant. In some areas, the birth rate continued to drop and the death toll continued to rise. The dwindling human population suffered from a lack of resources including clean water, shelter, and renewable energy sources. Human survival became dependent upon people dividing themselves into small, manageable groups. Over the next few decades, those who survived their brush with radiation sickness began to note physical changes to go along with the sudden emergence of latent psychic abilities.

Slowly, they became stronger, faster, and more resilient; while others succumbed to a mysterious illness people began to call the Star-Blight. Marked by a swift mental deterioration, the ill were quickly overwhelmed with madness and became violent and deranged before falling into a sudden coma, followed by heart failure, and then death. An individual could remain ill for years or days before death took them, leaving those around them confused and terrified of who would fall next.

Some viewed the Star-Blight as a form of natural selection; humanity was changing, becoming stronger and more suited to their wild, dangerous, new environment. Those who couldn’t handle the change would die. But even with their newfound resilience, life spans were still too short and birth rates remained low. Too Low.

In 2200 the Alpha-Beta-Omega Mutation was first reported. Humanity had changed. Evolution, in an attempt to battle declining birth rates, created a new system inside of which more of the population could potentially reproduce. Male and Female no longer dictated whether or not a person could bear a child; instead three new ‘dynamics’ or ‘subgenders’ emerged.

Alphas, characterized by their superior strength, protective instincts, and natural leadership abilities as well as an instinctual biological drive to sire children.

Omegas, naturally agile, graceful, nurturing beings whose biological need to bear and raise children made them ideal caretakers; dedicated to preserving peace and fiercely driven to guide and teach future generations.

Betas were the ballast, necessary to provide balance and genetic stability. The most unique amongst the new dynamics, their hormone production is dictated almost entirely by the biological makeup of those around them. If their family group is lacking in alphas, their bodies produce the necessary hormones to fill that role. If they lacked in omegas, the hormones they produced would allow their dormant reproductive organs to mature and enable them to bear children. Without the balancing aspects of Beta DNA, alphas and omegas would cease to exist.

Three ‘ABO Designation’ generations were born before, in 2275, the first people shifted from human to wolf. The ability to take on a primal form was considered to be evolutions ultimate last ditch effort to preserve humanity by providing them with a weapon in the form of their own bodies and shelter within their own fur. Perhaps the nomadic lifestyle humanity adapted had something to do with the form nature chose for them, but truely, like the development of the strange psychic gifts, the origin of the ability to shift would remain a mystery…

In those who were Star-Blighted, the ability to shift was not a blessing, but rather, a curse. People who suffered from Star-Blight found themselves unable to control their shifting. The would shift back and forth between human and wolf at random until one day they would simply get stuck somewhere between the two forms. These monstrosities, called the Rabid, were violent, bloodthirsty beasts that hunted what was left of humanity with a single minded focus. It was considered a blessing for a Star-Blighted family member to pass away before they became one of the most horrifying monsters that haunted their new world.

 

**POST-DESOLATION: THE WALLS**

 

Eventually, the amount of Rabid roaming free in the wild became a real threat to what remained of humanity. Too protect themselves, in 2280 it was decided that humanity would return from their self-imposed exile and join together to rebuild select cities, surrounding them with strong walls to keep out the Rabid. They could start over, not only with their own lives but with the story of the human species. They’d have live simply at first, but they would not have to live primitively. All of humanity’s knowledge was stored in books. They could rebuild slowly with sustainability in mind.

At first, the need for cooperation kept everyone in line. The need to build up the perimeter quickly and efficiently had to come before anything else. These fledgling cities were collectively known as the Walls. Outside of the Walls, smaller walled villages known as Compounds received resources and military protection from the Walls in exchange for their agricultural and industrial contributions- as long as they agreed to follow the law as decreed by the ruling body inside the Walls- The Committee.

Doctors and Scientists became world leaders and as a result, an unnatural amount of focus was put on maintaining the status quo between the three dynamics. Extensive genetic testing was done and the subgenders were broken down into six distinct types. AA and AB Alphas, OO and OB Omegas, and BB and AO Betas. Along with these types it was discovered just how essential betas were to ensure the continuation of the dynamics and that without their genetic contribution the dynamics would become unbalanced and humanity would go back to being unable to produce enough offspring to maintain the population.

To prevent this from happening, The Committee declared a ban on all relationships that weren’t with someone who was ‘genetically compatible’. Because of this, betas are often controlled and manipulated by their families for social and political gain. Male betas in particular were prized for their ability to mold themselves to the needs of their community; to assume to role of either alpha or omega in terms of siring or bearing children and in terms of ability.

Some inside the Walls, seeing the danger in this new system, sought to re-isolate themselves from this newly reformed version of civilization. These individuals sought to carve out their own place in the world, and so they left the city of Seoul behind to make use of the many islands surrounding the south western side of the peninsula. Teams were sent to clear the Rabid from a large island in the Yellow Sea known as Saeloun. There, the settlers rehabilitated what was left of the infrastructure of abandoned villages. Over the years the people who settled the island began to worship the moon, as it soon became apparent that the celestial body had a astounding effect on both their bodies and their psychic abilities.

A religion, built around the story of an Omega called Tal and her two mates, a Male Alpha named Hae and a genderless Beta called Chugun, became the basis of their society. A society that emphasizes a person’s right to live on instinct rather than the cold science that dominated life inside the Walls.

These islanders, called Taliians, lived a life in direct opposition to those inside the Walls, but in a world where humanity was dwindled to nothing more than a smattering of life in varying corners of the world, the two factions let each other live in peace.

On the peninsula that was once South Korea, initial projects aimed at restoring the major cities and walling them in, but it soon became apparent that without the population the world used to boast, there would be no way to maintain and protect so many fledgling communities. After a particularly devastating series of Rabid attacks, the decision was made to abandon construction in all area accept for Seoul, Daegu, and Busan.

The dwellers of those cities that were to be abandoned were invited to join those inside the Walls and many took them up on this offer. There were, however, those who regarded the ruined cities as their homes, their ancestral pack grounds and refused to leave them behind for the safety of the Walls, choosing instead to carve a place for themselves out amongst the wreckage. While they lacked the resources and the science to construct the great walls that surrounded the sanctioned cities, they used their survival instincts to make themselves invisible inside the ruins, relied on hunting and foraging to sustain themselves and eventually became the Wolfolk.

In 2300 MATCH program was set into motion inside Seoul; a program designed to sustain the population and balance the dynamics at the same time. At the age of five, every child  inside the Walls is tested for their subgender and type, and once they enter puberty they are tested again and added into a pool of potential mates. At eighteen they receive a list of individuals deemed to be more than 95% compatible. They are required to meet with at least one person on the list for at least an hour. Every year an updated list is sent and you have until you are twenty-five to choose a mate deemed as ‘compatible’.

After mating, a couple is required to meet their reproductive quota. Depending on the needs of their area of the city, they will be asked to produce a child of a certain subgender within the next five years to maintain a steady rise in all dynamics for future generations. Most often a second child is required of the couple as well. Any children produced that are not of that subgender are accepted but they couple is still required to produce the requested child. Failing to produce the requested subgender results in a fine. Failure to choose a compatible mate before your twenty-fifth birthday results in a fine. Choosing to mate someone outside of your government approved list of candidates results in a fine. Nothing is done to prevent you from making these choices, but the fines are meant to be harsh enough to discourage anyone from diverging from the approved course of action.

Because of the prevailing message from the Committee that the MATCH Program was ‘for the future’, the attitude of the general public towards those who did not follow the rules was less that favorable. Choosing to follow your instincts when it came to finding your mate was seen as a sign of poor self-control and over all selfishness. It was viewed as a person being too emotional and not thinking logically, as them thinking only of themselves and not off the good of the community or of how their actions could affect the future of the city as a whole. People in relationships that couldn’t provide anything ‘beneficial’ were especially looked down upon. Relationships between two individuals that could not produce any offspring were, in particular, regarded with an attitude of confusion and revulsion.  

Relationships consisting of more than a single mated pair were outright illegal, with the Committee declaring that those relationships took ‘useful’ DNA out of the available reproduction pool and therefore was a crime against the future of the Walls. Anyone discovered to be in a relationship like that would face forced separation and jail time, and little to no mercy from the public.

That same year, The Committee announced its blanket ban on shifting inside the Walls, proclaiming that those who shifted had a higher likelihood of going Rabid. The Committee declared that those who allowed themselves to give into their base urges and become a literal ‘beast’ were uncivilized and undeserving of a place within the Walls.

One year later they proclaimed those with psychic abilities, called the Touched, to be a danger to society and ordered family and friends to turn those they believed to be Touched over to Enforcement.

Initially those who were found to be Touched were simply exiled from the Walls and left to fend for themselves out in the Badlands. However, it soon became obvious that individuals with certain abilities were essentially, and therefore those who were deemed useful were rehabilitated and trained as Special Operative for Enforcement, those deemed dangerous were locked away or killed, and those who were deemed simply unfit for polite society were made to live out the rest of their days inside the Sanatorium.

In 2320 it became apparent that the MATCH program needed more individuals with unique DNA to sustain itself and so The Committee enacted its plan to bring the Wolfolk into the fold, sending out Enforcement teams to offer them a place inside the city and to take them by force if needed, killing their alphas, bringing their bearers and children back to the Walls. At the same time, they began to spread rumors that the Wolfolk, called the Shameless by Committee propaganda were dangerous, lawless individuals who abhorred the Walls and everything they stood for, ensuring that the Compounds wouldn’t offer aide to any Wolfolk who managed to escape Enforcement.

The Committee also tightened their control over who could enter and exit the city, effectively trapping those Taliians who came to the city for things like specialized medical care and trading, detaining them until it was ‘safe’ to leave while at the same time trying to force them to assimilate to life inside the Walls by forcing them to stop shifting and to renounce their ‘heathen’ religion. Often Taliians who entered Seoul would end up trapped there for a year or more depending on what time of year they entered.

Seoul’s harsh rules acted in direct contrast to the general mayhem inside Daegu and the Monarchy that ruled with an ironfist in Busan, so they populace accepted the rules put forth by the Committee as necessary to avoid the failings of the other resurrected cities, but there is a fraction of those inside the Walls who would see things change, a secret rebellion brewing right under the Committee’s nose; where those who are Touched live in the shadows and those who would follow the instincts of their beasts plan to demolish the system that would keep those who don’t follow it in poverty rather than give a single inch.

 

**THE TALIIANS**

 

In 2290, ten years after the decision to construct The Walls, a group of dissenters decided that life inside the Walls wasn’t for them and set out to find a place of their own. It was decided that attempting to live on the mainland wasn’t feasible without the protection the Walls provided and instead, guided by a vision of the future from one of their own, they chose to make their home on an island far out in the Yellow Sea. A team was dispatched to the 632 square mile island consisting of two mountainous peaks and plentiful lowlands for agriculture, and ancient pine forests for hunting, along numerous sources of fresh water. There they combed the island and it’s abandoned villages, eliminating any rogues and Rabid they came across. They settled down in the remains of the largest village on the east side of the island, lead by an omega woman and her two mates. The woman, who’s name was lost to history, is remembered mostly for her Touched ability; her prophetic visions. Over time she was deified by those who followed her and she became the embodiment of the Moon on Earth, Tal. Her mates consisted of an alpha man who history called Hae with the ability to manipulate fire which lead to him becoming the personification of the Sun to his mate’s Moon, and their co-mate a beta whose androgynous nature lead people to make their own assumptions about their gender, who was a healer of great stature known to have been so powerful they could bring people back from the dead if they got to them quickly enough. Called Chogun, they became the deity of life and death, personification of The Stars, the spark of chaos that wrought so much change on Earth.

Legend has it that the other deities the Taliians worship were the children on Tal and her mates, but science says that isn’t possible. People who are Touched that actively use their powers are infertile. The process of using their abilities raises their core body temperature so high that it renders their bodies incapable of procreation. People who had Passive abilities, like Foresight and Empathy, are incapable of controlling when or how they use their powers, though they can learn to manipulate and guide them in the right direction with practice over time. Those with Passive abilities can never regain their fertility, but people with Active abilities, the ones that require thought and action to use; such as power over the wind and rain- they could choose not to use their powers for a time, usually a period of a year or more, and regain their fertility. Sadly, this was only true for people who could sire children not those who could bear them. Damage done to eggs stored in ovaries is permanent and irreversible, while those with testicles can hope to recover sperm production over time.

This means that Tal more than likely never had any children, let alone so many children with Touched abilities. Nevertheless, the Taliians choose to believe that their various gods and goddess, called the Brood, are the children of Tal just as the Taliians themselves are the Children of Tal; The Great Moon Mother.

Life on the islands consists of mostly homesteading. Homes are usually large, multi-family pack houses that function off of alternative energy sources such as solar, wind, and water based power. Farming, raising livestock, hunting, gathering, and salvaging from the Mainland are key components to their survival. While most homes have electricity, they enforce strict lights-out hours and are very conscious of conserving energy. In most Taliian villages, two places have constant power, the Main Hall and the Temple. The Main Hall serves as the central food storage area, with large walk in freezers and refrigerators and an industrial style kitchen that serves the whole pack. The Temple serves as their emergency medical location, with a small surgical theatre and the ability to administer general anesthetic. The Temple receives medical supplies that they trade for from the Walls, although when it comes to most medical needs they rely on traditional and natural remedies. Both places are connected to back-up generators at all times.

Taliians are a diarchic society as their leadership is divided between the Pack Alpha and the Head Acolyte of Tal. The Pack Alpha sits at the head of the pack council, while the Head Acolyte of Tal is the leader of The Temple. The pack council sees to the day to day aspects of the pack including handing down justice when needed, while The Temple sees to the spiritual needs of the pack as well as their health needs as they train and provide healers to the village.

Every Pack Alpha comes tighter to form the main governing body of the Children of Tal. They meet once a year during the annual Summer Meeting on the Mainland. The leadership of the various temples form the Light of the Moon and meet yearly in the same way. In between meetings messages are delivered by trained birds and via Storytellers. The leader of the Alpha’s Council is called the Prime, and they are acknowledged as the overall leader of the Taliians as a whole. The alpha all other alpha’s have to defer to, they have often earned their place by challenge. When a Prime steps down or passes away, they name an heir. The Taliian people can either chose to accept that heir or name one of their own. A competition will be held to determine whether or not the Prime’s Successor will maintain their hold on the title of Prime.

The leader of the Light of the Moon is simply called The First. They are almost exclusively an Acolyte of Tal, but other servants of other members of the Brood have held the title in the past. Like their Prime counterpart, their authority inside the temple is absolute. They lead the important ceremonies during the Summer Meeting and once a year they administer the test that determines whether or not a trainee is ready to move onto acolyte status 

To reflect their diarchic leadership, members of Taliian packs dedicate themselves two-fold; picking a profession to master and a deity to pledge their loyalty to; a Calling and a Devotion as it was said. A person worked hard at their profession and they spent their life trying to live according to the ideals of your Devoted. Each person chooses their own path and the Acolytes help them achieve a closeness to Tal and Her Children as they follow that path. The goal is to have a population who individually excel at unique kills and who have a steady relationship with their gods.

Inside the main body of the Pack exists individual Hearths. Each Hearth is lead by an alpha who submits to the Pack Alpha. Newly mated individuals can choose to stay in their family home or establish a new Hearth. Some Hearths, such as the Saltwater Hearth maintained by the Bang Family in the Village of Haedoji can be traced all the way back to the founding of the village while newer Hearths, such as Kim Namjoon’s Butterfly Hearth are only a single generation old.

In contrast to those who live inside the Walls, Taliians believe that their wolf is part of their soul and to ignore it is to ignore Tal herself. Therefore, they believe that following your instincts to be an almost religious experience. Because of this belief, Taliians tend to be a more sexually free society than any other Post-Desolation people. Jealousy is considered to be a toxic emotion and possessiveness is frowned upon up to a certain extent. Following the example of their Goddess, many Taliians have more than one mate.

Their three main deities represent the alpha, beta, and omega spirit. They are represented in an Earthly way by the sun, moon, and stars. The saying use to go, ‘the sun is the counterpart of the moon, the moon compliments the stars, and the stars mirror the sun, but the sky is not complete without all three.’

It use to be that unions between alpha, beta, and omega was considered the perfect relationship as it mirrored the relationship of the Founders. But gradually over the years those type of unions fell out of favor. Partly because it became harder and harder to find a third person that they could get along with to complete the trio, but also because people became more concerned with lines of ascension.

In the past having more than one mate was something you did only out of love, but as times changed and people jockeyed for status a marked change began to happen amongst the mating habits of Taliians.

People began to take on mates for a variety of reasons leading to the concept of First Mates and Second Mates. A First Mate would be a mate an individual took on for love. They are bonded and there is a real, true relationship there. A Second Mate is usually a mate that is taken of for status, for political gain, so a bearer can have an extra set of helping hands around the house, or so that an alpha can gain a heir if their First Mate fails to produce one. In this situation, there is usually one person who has two individual mates, but those mates have no relationship with each other. These are called Cross-Mates. A trio of people or more who are all in a romantic relationship with each other are called Co-Mates.

There is a difference between Co-Mates and Second/Third/etc Mates aka Cross-Mates. Co-mates are people who are in a mutual relationship with each other. They are all mated to each other and all enjoy an intimate relationship. Co-mates are people who are in love, a unit, they’re all equal in their bond. A Second/Third/etc Mate is mate that a person chooses to take on outside of and separate from their original union. Second/Third/etc Mates are usually for social or political gain or to produce heirs and it’s not considered socially acceptable to show them any favoritism over a First Mate.

Example: An alpha who is already bonded with an omega decides to mate with another omega. The two omegas have no feelings for each other and therefore do not want to be in a union together. The second omega would then become the Alpha’s Second Mate and the two omegas would now be considered cross-mates as opposed to co-mates.

Most of the time Second Mates are for political or societal gain, usually more along the lines of a contractual agreement. Often they are so more children can be born to a Hearth. The Second Mate and the First Mate are not often involved with each other, and if they do become romantic/intimately involved, they can become co-mates. First and Second Mates might even live in different homes, though more often they simply have their own quarters within the packhouse. For example, the First Mate has a set of rooms, a drawing room, a bedroom, and a room for their pups, that they shares with their mate, and then the Second Mate will have the same style of apartment, and the shared Mate will stay with them when the mood strikes. It is considered inappropriate to live permanently with a Second Mate. One must still provide for them and acknowledge their children as children of one’s Hearth, but only the children that are favored are considered to be eligible for one’s status and inheritance.

Usually the custom of taking a Second/Third Mate is practiced by alphas and betas, rarely will an omega or an omega-aligned beta take on a second mate that is not a co-mate. When it comes to Second Mates, no one is forced into anything. Taliians are very much concerned with an Omega’s right to choose their own mate. If a Second Mate really wanted to could find another mate of their own. But because it would make lines of succession difficult to untangle omegas are generally discouraged from having more than one dominate mate. But overall the actual parentage of a child doesn’t matter, it matters whose Hearth they’re born to, so that’s where they get their status from. Agreeing to be a Second Mate can guarantee an Omega;s children have higher status, which is usually more than enough for some Omegas to make the choice.

Sexual freedom is important to Taliians, and people often have sex outside of their unions. For the Children of Tal, Moon Festivals are a time of socializing and celebrating. They learned long ago that the cycles of the Moon influenced the hormone levels of wolves, and even those who aren’t expecting a heat or a rut can feel the effects of a full moon. To discourage unpleasantness, anyone who is willing or wanting to have a little fun in their heightened state of arousal is invited to attend the Moon Festival where people indulge with whoever they want as long as all parties are willing.

In fact, Moon Festivals are so important to their culture that children thought to be conceived during a Moon Festival are often considered to be lucky and it’s said that they’re destined for the Temple.

Bondmates are what mated wolves are called after they exchange a mating bite; or ‘mark’. Not every mated pair/trio/etc choses to bond, and not every bond takes. A rejected bond can make a wolf very sick, so people have to be very sure that their wolf halves have accepted each other before they attempt to exchange marks. Often choosing to become bondmates involves going to the temple for guidance and seeking counseling with the Acolytes there.

In addition to bondmates, there exists also the concept of true mates. Anyone can mate anyone, but everyone has at least one true mate out there, it's just that sometimes they never meet them their whole lives. Meeting your true mate is signaled by the Pull, the Pull is a physical/biological response to your true mate. Often described as a sensation of the Earth moving but you’re still standing still; the pull is more so a sign that two individuals are essentially made for each other—perfectly compatible. In terms of science they'd produce offspring with superior genes. The instinct to act on the Pull is the same instinct that drives people to mate during Heats and Ruts; a deep seated need to ensure their lineage.

Amongst Taliians, hunting partners are bonded similarly to mates. It’s said that hunting partners exchange pieces of each other’s soul to keep them in tune with each other and encourage them to look out for each other.

Taliians are marked so they can easily identify each other and show which Packs they belong to. They also believe that the marks keep them honest; you can’t lie and deceive anyone if your true identity is right there for everyone to see. The backs of their right hands are tattooed with the unique, distinct insignia of their Pack. Receiving your First Mark is a right of passage and signifies a juvenile wolf's ascension into the rank of adults. A mark on the bicep shows which dynamic a person belongs to, one on shoulder marking the temple a person has Devoted themselves to, and a more complicated series that run up the inside of the left forearm is made up of symbols that when read detail a person’s history; the hearth of their birth, their Calling, their mating, anything that someone might need to know about them is etched in a design that flows together almost seamlessly to the untrained eye.

Those who serve the Temple have an additional tattoo across their right cheek bone depicting the phases of the moon. The more complete the cycle is, the farther into their training an Acolyte is. A fully trained Acolyte will have the entire cycle from start to finish spanning across their cheek. Certain embellishments to the design depict an acolytes rank within the Temple as well.

 

**THE TALIIAN PANTHEON:**

 

Tal - Moon Goddess; The First Omega. Legend has it that she birthed the Taliian people and continues to guide them through their Earthly lives until they one day return to her side. Mate of Hae and Chugun. Goddess of the Past, Present, and Future. Patron Deity of the Touched. Sacred of Omegas, and Protector of Bearers.

 Hae - Sun God; The First Alpha. Watches over Her People while She sleeps. Deity of Justice, Civil Order, and War. Mate of Tal and Chugun. Sacred of Alphas, and Guiding Light to all Alphas.

 Chugun - Life & Death. Genderless, but often depicted as male. The First Beta. Guides Her People from their Earthly bodies back to Her side. Mate of Tal and Hae. Sacred to Betas.

 

**THE BROOD**

 

Chijin - A Beta God of the Earth. Male. He Who Provided the Islands. God of Fertile Land.

Konggi - An Omega Goddess of the Sky. Female. Bringer of Rain, Clean Fresh Air, and the keeper of the Moon Temple where Tal lives.

Mul - A Beta Goddess of the Sea. Female. The Endless Provider; Goddess of Fishing. Guides and Protects those who travel to the Mainland on Salvage Expeditions and ensures that they return safely.

Namu - An Alpha God of the Forest. Male. Provides foraging and building materials; Patron of Famine and Shelter.

Pul - An Alpha God of Fire. Male. Fire is essential for Taliian survival, but it can also be deadly. Pul is a respected, revered, and feared God.

Sanyang - An Alpha Goddess of Hunting. Female. Guides hunters on their quest for prey, directs their hand as they hunt. Provides dutiful worshipers with good luck in their hunting endeavors.

Tongmul - An Omega Goddess of Animals. Female. Watches over animals in the fields and ensures their good health.

Nongbu - An Omega God of Farming. Male. Patron of the Harvest, Planting, and Protector of Fields.

Kongang & Uihak - Beta & Omega Twin Deities of Health & Healing; Brother and Sister. Kongang is a Beta God who specializing in Traditional Medicine, and Uihak is a Omega Goddess whose realm in Childbirth.

Nunbora - An Alpha Goddess of the Snow. Female. Snow is a big factor in how Taliians live their day to day lives; Cosmic Winter means long, hard periods of cold and heavy snow. Respecting Snow as the game changer that it is, is and absolute necessity and therefore they pay Nunbora the utmost respect so that their winters will be short and the frost will come late enough for them to secure the harvest.

Misul - An Omega Goddess of Crafting. Female. Source of Inspiration and Artistic Ability of all who wish to create.

Nanlo - A Beta Goddess of the Hearth. Female. Watches over the Hearth, Protects the Packhouse when no one is there. Ensures Harmony within the Home.

Kyolhon - A Beta God of Mating/Bonding. Male. Works Closely with Tal and Nanlo to find the perfect mates for each of Her Children. Blesses Unions and Bonds. Fertility and Love are his specialties.

 

**THE WOLFOLK**

 

Originally called the Wolf Folk, the name over time flowed together to become the Wolfolk. The ancestors of the Wolfolk were those who chose to stay behind in the ruins of what were once great cities, refusing to abandoned their ancestral homes. While some Wolfolk are nomadic, most have a permanent home hidden away somewhere in the stone tombs of cities long dead.

They rely a large amount upon hunting a foraging as raising livestock and growing crops requires large amounts of land space and makes it hard for them to keep themselves hidden from Rabid and Rogue alike. Every Wolfolk village is different, as each one has uniquely adapted to the territory they live in.

Packs are generally small, ten to fifteen being the norm while pack of thirty or more find it hard to stay safe and hidden.  A surprising amount of the Wolfolk are Touched, most likely due to the fact that in the early years of the ban, the Walls use to throw those whose powers they deemed to be too ‘dangerous’ out of the city which lead them to intermingle with the Wolfolk.

In addition, or probably in part due to this phenomenon, most Wolfolk packs have traditions and rituals that are conducive to genetic diversity. The most benign of those being that matings inside the pack are frowned upon and mechanisms exist for young people of different packs to meet. More extreme packs will have bans of mating with some who shares the same Clan name as them. Slightly more problematic is when young alphas are kicked out at a certain age and can only return if and only when they bring a mate back with them. Perhaps the worst case is when young omegas of other packs are systematically captured and sometimes all their relatives killed to prevent them coming after them. Most Wolfolk tribes are peaceful and resent their barbarian reputation inside the Walls, but some of them have given into their more base instincts, especially those closer to Daegu where chaos seems to reign even in the surround areas that make up the Badlands outside the city.

Wolfolk are incredibly territorial when it comes to both their cities and their hunting grounds, and skirmishes between both other Wolfolk packs, Rogues, and even Compounders are not uncommon. They tend to rove far from home in their wolf forms in search of hunting and areas to forage, often traveling by having their smaller, lighter weight packmates ride on their backs in human form in order to carry supplies and help bring their haul back.

Most Wolfolk packs are rules by a single family with an alpha handing down leadership to their first born alpha offspring generation to generation and therefore are called after the Clan Name of their ruling alpha, i.e. the Lee Pack.

 

**IMPORTANT PEOPLES AND PLACES:**

 

**_PEOPLES:_ **

 

Citizens: Those who live inside the Walls; particularly Seoul.

Compunders: Those who live inside the sanctioned villages outside the Walls, who supply the Walls with useful agricultural products and industrial resources in exchange for electricity and protection from the Rabid.

The Colonies: Fledgling Compounds often far, far from the Walls they pledge allegiance to. Often located in the most dangerous parts of the Badlands, they are tasked with settling the land and carving out a foothold for the Walls in that area. Often people are sent to the Colonies as a punishment, and people who struggle inside the Walls will often volunteer for the Colonies as a last ditch effort to survive. The Colonies are notoriously dangerous, untrained, and undersupplied. Most of them are wiped out by Rogues or Rabid barely a year after they’re founded.

 

Taliians: Those who live on the islands along the southwestern coast of the peninsula and revere the Moon.

Sangilions: A particular subset of the Taliian people native to the island of Saeloun; they reject Tal and instead worship the sun, her mate Hae. They are a civilization of raiders that rely on brute force to survive on top of their mountain.

 

The Chayuroun: A small civilization founded in 2285 on an island far to the north in the Yellow Sea. Their population consists of almost entirely Omegas with a few genetic throwbacks to Betas mixed in.

 

Wolfolk: Fringe dwellers who live inside the ruins of abandoned cities. Called the Shameless by those inside the Walls for their reliance on their wolflike ability to survive in the Badlands.

 

The Rabid: Those who have reached the final stages of the Star-Blight and have descended into madness; stuck between their human and wolf forms, driven by a need to hunt healthy humans.

Rogues: Those who choose to reject any form of law and order, roaming nomadically throughout the Badlands, they rely on violence and survival of the fittest to survive,; often at the expense of others. Murder and thievery are their bread and butter.

 

**_PLACES:_ **

 

Seoul: Most Commonly Referred to as ‘The Walls’. A Walled in City built upon the ruins of what use to be the Capital of South Korea. Ruled by the Committee, the Walls upholds an unwavering belief in science and uniformity, believing that it is key to the continuation of the human race.

Wonju Compound: A Compound to the North West of Seoul, dedicated to the Walls they are a lumber district overseen by the Yang Family.

 

Saeloun: An Island in the Yellow Sea, about three hours by hydrofoil from Incheon. Location of the original Taliian settlement. Those who live there follow the guidance of both their pack leaders and the Temple of the Moon; a religious sect dedicated to the worship of the Omega Moon Goddess Tal.

Haedoji: Located on Saeloun; The Oldest Taliian Village, the Original Taliian Settlement. Home of the Shore Pack, their leading family is the Bangs.

Kangbyon: Second Oldest Taliian Village, the Second Settlement on Saeloun founded after Haedoji became too crowded. Home of the River Pack, their leading family is the Parks.

Sangil: Third Oldest Taliian Village, the Third Settlement on Saeloun. Founded after a fissure developed over the leadership of Kangbyon. Home of the Mountain Pack, their leading family is the Lees. A splinter religion, they instead choose to worship the Alpha Mate of Tal, the Sun God Hae.

 

Baengnyeong: A island far to the North of Saeloun off the coast of what use to be North Korea; home of the Chayurouni Tribe - a Warrior Race comprised almost entirely of Omegas and a select few Betas who generations ago escaped from a dangerous group of alphas who intended to enslave them. They isolate themselves and do not associate with people off their shores. Alphas are forbidden on their island.

 

The Haven: A Secret Village located inside the Ruins of Old Gwangju. A Wolfolk settlement; home of the Jung Pack- it is located almost entirely inside of a few rehabilitated apartment buildings, sort of like a town inside of a building.

 

Jirisan: A summer village belonging to the Taliians located in the heart of an ancient forest near the Southern end of the Korean Peninsula. Large enough to accommodate the entirety of the Taliian nation, it is only occupied from Mid-May to Mid-August. Designed as a summer home to allow their islands to recuperate from constant human occupation, Jirisan consists of a collection of sturdy wooden packhouses- one for each Pack- with enough cleared land to pitched tents in between; as well as a Temple and an arena for competitions such as wrestling and foot races and a central square area for festivals.

 

**ABO SUBGENDER GENOTYPES**

 

As a result of the gamma radiation combined with environmental stressors, human evolution responded by separating the second chromosomal pair back into two distinct pairs. Called 2A and 2B, these chromosomes then mutated. 2A developed the genes that would lead to the ability to shift into wolves, and 2B developed the genes that determined a person's reproductive anatomy in regards to their subgender.

The pair of chromosomes that make up 2B each contain one of the Alpha, Beta, or Omega alleles. Each person inherits one allele from each parent. The paired alleles are called genotypes. There are a total of six different genotypes a person can have: AA, AB, OO, OB, BB, and AO.

Alpha and Omega alleles are dominant, meaning people with the AA and AB genotypes are Alphas and people who make up the OO and OB genotypes are Omegas. The BB genotype results in a Beta, however, people who have the AO genotype are Betas as well since the two dominant alleles cancel each other out.

 

Example: A Male Alpha, Genotype AB and a Female Omega, Genotype OB would have a 25% chance of producing a AO Beta, a 25% chance of an OB Omega, a 25% chance of an AB Alpha, and a 25% chance of producing a BB Beta, or a 50% chance of producing a Beta offspring as opposed to the likelihood that they’d produce another Alpha or Omega being 25% each.

 

XYab ➝

  


XXob ↓  

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      Xa

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       Xb

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       Ya

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       Yb  
  
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      Xo

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     XXao

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     XXob

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     XXab

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    XXbb

|    


     XYab

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    XYbb  
  
     

      Xo

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    XYao

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    XYob  
  
     

      Xb

|    


    XXab

|    


    XXbb

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    XYab

|    


   XYbb  
  
 

**REPRODUCTIVE ANATOMY**

 

The presence of the Alpha/Beta/Omega alleles in Chromosome 2B rewrites the rules when it comes to how the X and Y Chromosomes behave.

Between the fifth and seventh weeks after fertilization, human embryos of either sex develop two primordial gonads that will by the eight week commit themselves to becoming wither testes or ovaries.

If either the Y Chromosome of the alpha allele is present, one gonad will become a teste. If there is no Y Chromosome or alpha allele present one will become an ovary.

All embryos are endowed with the same all-purpose structures that determine the growth the developing person’s reproductive organs. The development of these reproductive structures are triggered by secretions released from the testes called androgens.

At the direction of these androgens; male alphas, male betas, and male omegas will develop typical external male genitalia- and the absence of these androgens for female alphas, betas, and omegas when it comes to developing typical external female genitalia.

It is the presence of the omega and beta alleles in combination with the Y Chromosome; and the alpha allele in combination with the X Chromosome that alters the configuration of then internal reproductive structures.

Embryos start out with two sets of ducts known as the Müllerian Ducts and the Wolffian Ducts. In absence of the testes, Wolffian Ducts atrophy while the Müllerian Ducts grow into the uterus, fallopian tubes, and the inner part of the vagina. With testes present, the opposite happens; androgens produced by the testes stimulates the Wolffian Ducts to develop into seminal vesicles, vas deferens, and epididymis.

In male alphas a testicular protein called Müllerian Inhibiting Factor prevents the Müllerian Ducts from developing into the internal childbearing organs. In female alphas, the presence of the second  X Chromosome prevents Müllerian Inhibiting Factor from being produced, allowing female alphas to develop their childbearing organs.

The combination of the second X Chromosome and the alpha allele influences the synthesis of each individual enzyme required to build functioning internal reproductive structures, leading to the unique alpha female configuration of organs that allows them to both sire and bear children.

In female alphas, one gonad develops into an ovary while the other develops into a teste. The ovary is connected to the uterus by a fallopian tube while the teste and the surrounding epididymis are housed in a protective layer of tissue that is connected by a vas deferens to a seminal vesicle that takes the place of one Bartholin’s Gland located in between the vulva and the opening of the vagina. While the ducts of the Bartholin’s Gland secretes the fluids required for the natural lubrication of the vagina; the ducts of the seminal vesicle in combination with the vas deferens secretes semen and spermatozoa upon orgasm; allowing an alpha female to potentially fertilize any other individual with childbearing organs.

During sexual intercourse the presence of submissive pheromones causes a female alpha’s cervix to swell, closing it off and preventing her own reproductive material from reaching her eggs. When a female alpha chooses to submit to another person, her cervix does not swell and instead the tissue housing the teste and epididymis swells, preventing sperm from being secreted upon orgasm. When allowing penetration, an alpha female’s vaginal walls swell to lock her partner in place; similar to the knot developed by an alpha male.

In male alphas, the first gonad descends into the scrotum and divides into the testes, and the second gonad descends and becomes the bulbus glandis aka the ‘knot’; tissue located at the base of the penis that swells up to lock the alpha into place inside their partner in the moments before ejaculation. They remain locked together until the swelling goes down, ensuring that no sperm is wasted. Often a male alpha will cycle through numerous orgasms as their knot goes down, all while locked in place.

In female omegas and betas, the process is fairly simple; the second gonad atrophies and is reabsorbed into the body leaving them with a function set of childbearing reproductive organs.

Similar to Female Alphas, the presence of the Y Chromosome in relation to the Omega and Beta Alelles in Male Betas and Male Omegas determines the unique way their internal reproductive structures develop, one gonad becomes the testes, splitting and descending into the scrotum, while the other develops into ovaries which are then attached to the uterus by fallopian tubes. A short vaginal opening is located inside the rectum leading to the cervix. Outside of Heats, the opening is sealed shut by a flap of tissue. During heats, the tissue blocking the vaginal opening swells, blocking the rectum and allowing for sanitary access to the cervix and thus the uterus. Hormones secreted during Heats allow for enhanced muscle elasticity, easing anal penetration. A Bartholin’s Gland located a the vaginal opening secretes what it colloquially known as ‘slick’ during Heats as well, to aid in the process of anal penetration. Those same hormones allow for the tissues of the anus and rectum to easily and safely stretch during childbirth, giving male betas and omegas the ability to birth their children naturally without medical intervention.

Male Omegas begin to experience their Heats at the onset of puberty, while Male Betas reproductive abilities remain dormant until their place in their pack structure is determined. Once their role has been assigned, they will either develop a Heat or a Rut to suit their role. A Beta can switch dynamics based upon the pheromones of their sexual partner and once bonded often falls into one role and stays there. For example, a Male Beta is mated to a Male Alpha, the beta's body will be triggered to begin producing Omega Dominant hormones, which will in turn trigger the maturation of their childbearing organs and thus a Heat allowing them to become pregnant and bear children. A Male Beta mated to an Omega would begin to produce Alpha Dominant Hormones which would trigger a Rut and thus the production of the reproductive material needed to sire a child. A Male Beta mated to another Male Beta’s designation would depend on which individual was more dominant in terms of rank. A Male Beta in a relationship with more than one person might struggle with their place in the pack, especially if one mate is more dominant while the other is more submissive, causing their hormones to swing rapidly between Alpha Dominant and Omega Dominant. The rapid hormonal shifting often leads to an illness called Diametrical Breakdown Syndrome characterized by hot flashes, night sweats, sudden weight loss, nausea, loss of appetite, stomach cramps, loss of muscle mass, irritability, trouble sleeping, fatigue, memory loss, and lowered sex drive. If the issue is not resolved it can lead to a coma and eventually death.

 

In same-sex relationships the person who contributed their dna to the creation of the child is called the Sire and the person who gave birth to them is called the Bearer. A female alpha who contributed their dna is refereed to as ' _Isa_ ' by their children and a male omega or beta who birthed a child is called ' _Beba_ '. Mother and Father are normally used by male-female pairings. However, any combination of terms that suits a family best is tolerated. For example, a pup can have a female omega bearer, aka their mother and male alpha father, aka their sire. Another pup can have a male alpha Sire, aka their father and a male omega Bearer, aka their _beba_.

 

 

 

 

**BIOLOGY OF SHIFTING**

 

A person’s ability to shift relies entirely upon a special cell similar to stem cells called ‘Catalyst Cells’. Like stem cells, a person’s body contains catalyst cells throughout their entire life and their body can use them whenever it needs them. Catalyst Cells do not have a specific role in the body and can become any cell that is required of them. Unlike stem cells, which become more tissue-specific when an embryo reaches maturity, Catalyst Cells retain their embryonic state. Produced and circulated by the scent glands located on the sides of the throat, inside of wrists, and on the inner thigh; Catalyst Cells are present in the brain, bone marrow, blood and blood vessels, skeletal muscles, skin, and liver primarily. Most of the time they are dormant and have to be activated when the body ‘calls’ on them using certain hormonal triggers; but in times of dire need the body can use Catalyst Cells to make repairs and grow new tissue- lending to humanities new found resilience and increased healing factor.

Catalyst Cells can divide and self-renew indefinitely, meaning they can mimic various cell types, allowing them to heal flesh wounds, knit broken bones, and even regenerate damaged organs if given enough time. As previously stated, Catalyst Cells remain dormant until the right combination of hormones activates them, then they begin to divide rapidly- attaching themselves to the nearest aspects of their host’s body and altering the body from the inside out. Some Catalyst Cells attack and breakdown existing bodily structures to make room for new growth or reshaping them into the best base to suit a person’s transformation.

A person’s body can on average produce and store enough Catalyst Cells to transform from human to wolf and back at most three times in a twenty-four hour period. The cells require the right combination of hormones to activate, but the quickness with which they allow a person to change requires that an exhaustingly large amount of energy be available to burn, meaning that those who shift have to eat a high calorie, high protein diet to be able to change with any kind of speed or grace.

After a person has burned through their store of Catalyst Cells they usually require a cooling down period of twelve to twenty-four hours to build up enough cells to shift again, leaving the individual essentially trapped in whatever form they were in last when their reserves ran out. It is recommended that a person try to avoid becoming trapped in their animal form. Spending too long in wolf form puts one at risk for memory loss, personality changes, and eventually the loss of the ability to shift back into their primary human form as the beast takes over entirely and overrides the shifter’s human nature. It is also recommended that a person not try to shift again until the required time has elapsed and their stores have been renewed as there is the potential to become ‘caught’ in between forms; a condition known as going ‘Rabid’.

While forcing yourself to change and becoming caught between form is a rare feat, one often only accomplished by those who are truly desperate to change, there is an illness known as the Star-Blight that causes a person’s Catalyst Cells to become unstable, activating outside of normal protocol, and therefore causing a person to shift back and forth rapidly without being able to maintain a proper cool down period. Prolonged time in their wolf form coupled with their inevitable fate of becoming stuck in between the two forms eventually causes them to go mad and thus they become one of the Rabid, a condition for which there is as of yet no known cure.

 

**_OUR STORY BEGINS IN 2395, ninety-five years after the imposition of the MATCH program and one-hundred and five years after the Taliians separated from the Walls. The Wolfolk have been resisting the Committees attempts to bring them into the fold for the past seventy-five years, but things are beginning to come to a head on that front. The Committee is currently lead by Kim Jinsun, a cold and calculating Alpha whose ruthless pursuit of the Wolfolk and whose crack down on those who would avoid the MATCH Program is beginning to stir feelings of dissent in the general population._ **

**_On Saeloun, the Shore Pack- the oldest and most powerful of the Taliian settlements- is lead by Alpha Bang Shihyuk while high in the mountains the Village of Sangil rots from the inside out._ **

**_In the ruins of Old Gwangju the Alpha of the Jung Pack has passed away, leaving his young son Hoseok to lead in his place._ **

**_While away in the Compounds outside Seoul, a young man struggles with a gift he can hardly stand to bear._ **

**_Inside the Walls, locked away inside the Sanatorium, a man with a similar gift struggles to find his way in a world that looks to only be made up of varying shades of gray._ **

**_And a young beta runs from it all._ **

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Come see me on twitter: [@vinniekpop](https://twitter.com/vinniekpop)
> 
> CuriousCat: [@climbingvines](https://curiouscat.me/climbingvines1)


	2. followed by a moonshadow

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As I said before, I understand if you're not fans of both groups but I'm begging y'all to give this a chance. :) I'm posting this at 3:00am which seems like it's gonna be par for the course with this fic so please enjoy all my typos until my eyeballs work again and I can edit it properly. Also y'all I saw BTS on Sunday and it was cold and wet but they were beautiful as always and I'm still not over it. <3 Now if only iKon would announce their world tour lmao.
> 
> \- Vinnie
> 
> p.s. don't worry if you're not fond of YG... he won't be around for very long asdfdsjfjsdjk

_October 3rd, 2395_

_Wonju Compound_

 

 

In the middle of the path stood a wolf.

There had been an accident at the new grove they’d started felling last week, one of their key chains snapped and they needed a replacement brought up in the truck. So they’d sent Hanbin back to the Compound since he was the quickest. He could get there on foot and back before they’d burned too much daylight. It was supposed to be an easy, boring run. Maybe about two hours if he pushed himself. He’d barely started running, only thirty minutes in and just beginning to fall into a comfortable stride when the creature stepped into his path.

At first he thought it was a wild wolf, but there was something wrong with the joints of its front legs that made it look more like a bear than a wolf. And it was bigger than any wild wolf he'd ever seen. It’s form was twisted and lopsided, the coarse hair covering it's body was patchy, revealing sections of red, irritated skin. The creature hesitated when it saw Hanbin, like it might run. They both stood, frozen, as the beast took it's time sizing Hanbin up. He tried to stand tall and confident, letting out a cloud of alpha pheromones to emphasis his bored appearance. Sometimes, he knew, when a predator is challenged by a stronger foe said predator would leave. But somehow he didn't think that this beast was an animal who could be intimidated- there was an eerie intelligence in its eyes.

Hanbin might not have known what to call it at first, but it only took him a few seconds of eye contact to know what it was. In that beast's face lurked every nightmare image that haunted day to day life in the Compounds. He barely dared to breathe...

This was a Rabid.

Whatever spell that had kept it from attacking him broke and the beast snarled. It jerked, twitched and Hanbin stumbled back in horror as it began to shift before his very eyes. Paws became misshapen clawed hands, haunches became sloped shoulders leading to a twisted spine that prevented it from standing up fully. It screamed, the sound cracking from howl to humanoid bellow as it lifted it’s head and he was suddenly staring into the eyes of something more woman than wolf.

Before he could fully comprehend what was happening she shrieked and launched herself at him. Spittle dripped from razor sharp fangs as her hands reached, desperate, for his throat. He threw himself to the side in an effort to save himself, rolling across the forest floor as he scrambled to free the knife from the sheath strapped to his hip.

Hanbin wasn't a helpless boy; he was an alpha. He was strong, quick, smart, agile. He'd gotten the knife from a trader years ago, but he’d never had an occasion to use it. The knife was covered with charms that were etched directly into the blade; strange symbols that had long ago turned black instead of the bright silver they''d once been. Exotic, probably Taliian in origin, it was a good knife and despite his inexperience wielding it, it bit deep into the Rabid's shoulder.

The beast was faster than Hanbin had expected, faster and stronger. But he'd gotten that first strike in and crippled it, and that made all the difference. The woman hissed and screamed, rolling away from him and lurching to her feet. She ran into the forest, disappearing into the undergrowth in seconds.

He laid there on the ground breathing hard for a moment before he forced himself to get up and run. He had to make it back to the grove, had to let the team there know that there were Rabid in the area, because if there was one there were more. Just like the humans they once were, Rabid were attracted to each other and formed packs of their own; murderous packs that killed anything that came across their path.

He pushed himself, his feet eating up the dirt and rocks as he launched himself at breakneck speed around boulders and over creeks.

His instincts screamed at him that there was something at his back, eyes fixed on him from all sides, and his heart raced in his chest. Adrenaline spiked throughout his system and he felt something shift inside him; an extra boost of speed, a longer stride, faster reflexes. He catapulted over a small gully and barely stumbled as he landed on the other side.

He imagined the sound of footfalls landing behind him but he didn’t dare turn his head to look. His lungs burned and his mind registered the fact that he’d already managed to travel back half the distance that he’d ran before in nearly a quarter of the time.

He recognized a stony outcrop in the distance and breathed a sigh of relief when he realized that the grove was just on the other side. His pace slowed just a bit, his stride shortened and that’s when it happened.

A solid mass smashed into him from behind, rolling him head over feet across the rocky ground and he smelled blood. He barely had time to register that pain when the mass- the _man_ \- sunk his teeth into Hanbin’s shoulder. Hanbin screamed, bucked and kicked and the man grunted, as he was thrown from the struggling young alpha. Hanbin heard a hysterical, mad sort of laughter floating across the clearing and he turned to see the woman he’d stabbed, standing there holding her arm as blood slowly seeped from the wound to cake and dry on her skin. She watched Hanbin struggled with the Rabid, he realized the man must be her mate, with gleeful eyes set in her wretched face. He was more gone than she, the mate appearing to be almost entirely animal, no trace of humanity in eyes set in a face that barely retained any of the man he’d once been.

Hanbin reached for his knife but the woman shrieked, shrill and jarring, and the man smashed his fist into Hanbin’s wrist. He dropped the knife with a gasp as he felt the bones snap, blood still pouring from the bite mark on his shoulder. He curled up in an attempt to shield himself, dazed, as the man descended on him again, a powerful chest and thick clawed fingers set to tear him to shreds.

A shout echoed across the clearing and the Rabid halted it’s assault. Pounding footsteps shook the ground as someone ran towards them and a shot rang out. The Rabid fell in an instant, it’s body slumping across Hanbin’s, nothing but dead weight. He wretched as the smell of the creature finally reached his nostrils, death and rot.

Someone rolled the corpse off of him and he was yanked to his feet by his good arm.

“Are you alright, boy?” A gruff voice asked, and he looked up to see his father standing before him. Leader of the Wonju Compound, Yang Hyunsuk wasn’t his father by birth, but he was the only father he could remember. When Hanbin was just an infant, his omega mother had been found wandering in the forest outside the Compound. Upon being brought inside it was discovered that she’d been attacked, by who no one knew, and there was a deeply infected wound to her abdomen. She died less than a day later. Hyunsuk and his mate Eunju adopted the infant son she had left behind and raised him as their own. Hanbin was his legal heir and for all intents and purposes the eventual leader of the Wonju Compound.

“I’m fine.” Hanbin said automatically, but his statement was followed by a snort from behind Hyunsuk’s back. He glared beyond his father, to where he could see his best friend stand there, looking between Hanbin and the downed Rabid.

“Yeah, you look great, Bin.” Junhoe said and Hanbin laughed, almost instinctively. The movement sent pain flaring through his shattered wrist and his torn shoulder. He wondered how the man knew to strike at his wrist. Had the woman told him? Could Rabid tell each other things?

When he thought of the woman he swore and looked around the clearing with a start, “Did you get her, too?”

“Get who?” Hyunsuk asked, sharp and no nonsense.

“The other Rabid, the woman! There were two of them, the woman attacked me first and when I tried to come back and warn you they followed me. She must have run off when you yelled…”

Hyunsuk frowned, looking towards the forest edge where Hanbin pointed.

“Well she’s gone now. We’ll have to abandon this part of the forest for the time being.” He sighed, probably calculating how best to rotate their planned timeline for the season so as to not put too much stress on any particular part of the forest. “We need to set out if we’re going to make it back to the Compound by night fall, we can’t get caught out here after dark with Rabid lurking about.” He looked Hanbin up and down, “And we need to let Doc take a look at you. That bite looks nasty, who know what kind of diseases this thing could have picked up...” He nudged the corpse with the toe of his boot. “You good to walk, kid?”

“I’ll make sure he doesn’t fall behind, sir.” Junhoe took off his shirt and with his own knife ripped it into stripes, using it to wrap Hanbin’s shattered wrist and tie to his midsection. Hanbin salvaged what was left of his own bloody shirt and used it to bandage his savaged shoulder.

Hyunsuk clapped Junhoe on the shoulder. They set off together, leaving the dead Rabid behind on the ground; a warning to anything else that might come to the area. The grove was filled with the rest of the felling party, all of them standing, tense, as they wait for their alpha to return.

Hyunsuk gave the order and the workers jumped to attention, packing away their fledgling camp; loading the equipment onto the carrying platforms and hitching them over their shoulders to make the two hour trek back home. The party moved quickly, but not as fast as they would have unburdened. Normally Hanbin’s job when they traveled was to run scout with Junhoe and the other younger pack members, running a circuit around the group as they traveled to flush out any danger and to direct them around obstacles that might slow them down. Today, he was forced to travel with the main group, struggling to keep up as every step jerked his wrist and wrenched his shoulder. Junhoe walked next to him, ribbing him gently as they walked. Taunting him and goading him into pushing himself, but it was all covered by a thin veil of affection and concern.

By the time they reached the Wonju Compound Hanbin was dead on his feet, but as their future leader he forced himself to walk in with his head held high. Eunju rushed out to meet him, her two biological pups trailing after her as she pushed her way through the crowd. She gripped his face in her tiny hands and promptly burst into tears.

“Ma, I’m fine.” He hushed her, but he let her lead him into the town hall and into the basement where Doc Kwon worked.

Doc Kwon was a jovial old alpha with a wife and two children that ran the tiny clinic in the basement of the town hall where he functioned as both their doctor and their coroner. Doc was Hyunsuk’s cousin and his only living relative. His son, Jiyong, had been the next in line for leadership of the Compound before Hanbin had come along, and now that Hyunsuk had two son’s Jiyong was free of any responsibility to the pack. Doc had sent the alpha off to Seoul almost a year ago to attend their free education program aimed at getting better medical care out to the compounds, but about six months ago he’d stopped receiving word from his son. It pained Hanbin on an instinctual level to see the pain in his uncle’s eyes these days. They’d sent word to the Walls asking Enforcement to search for Jiyong but they’d received no response as of yet. Hanbin knew the general opinion in the Compound was that Jiyong had left the Walls the return home and had fallen victim to one of the many dangers one faced when they dared to venture outside the safety the Committee provided in the safezones.

Today Doc looked Hanbin over with grim worry etched into the lines around his mouth. A Rabid attack so close to home must seem like a confirmation to him, that his son had died a terrible death.

Hanbin wished he could tell him that wasn’t true.

There wasn’t a single member of their pack who had died in the last ten years that he didn’t know about.

For the past decade, ever since he’d presented as an alpha, Hanbin had been plagued by strange visions of death. In particular, the members of his pack were the ones his visions seemed to seek out the most; perhaps it was due to his position as their future alpha, but his powers seemed to be almost bound to the people who lived in Wonju.

He tried not to see; it could get in the way of a lot of things. He tried to block out that knowing. Like sometime he knew that the packmate that brushed past him in the square had cancer. Or that the pup playing in the market would fall and and never get back up that very afternoon.

When it first started the visions weren’t of death. Accidents. Cuts, bumps, and bruises. Illness. It could be so specific at times that when he was younger he’d made a game out of it, but it had started to spook him when his visions started foretelling death, so he stopped. This gift he had, he knew the Taliians called it being Touched but to those inside the Walls and those outside then who followed their authority, it was more akin to being Cursed. For Hanbin it was like he was watching it all on a big screen inside his head. Like the big screens that hung above the Service Center in the middle of Seoul, where the Committee held their seats and made decisions for everyone under their authority.

He’d only seen the big screens once, when he was very young, when Eunju had brought him to Seoul to have his blood tested and register him as Citizen. He’d been issued his first ID card that day and he and his mother had stood outside until the big screens flashed with his picture and name, his blood type and secondary gender announced for all the see. He’d been about five years old but the sight of his own chubby cheeked face lighting up the sky just as the sun started to go down, the people around them who recognized him patting his mother on the back, congratulating her on a strong alpha son, had stuck with him ever since. After a beta, an alpha was the most sought after offspring. Alphas meant dedication and protection. Alphas were strong shoulders to lean on and cool heads to prevail.

When his visions overtook him he felt like he was back inside the Walls, five years old and staring helplessly up at a screen that played out a scene he was powerless to turn off. He tried before. Tried to stop the visions from happening. But he learned very quickly that there was nothing he could do. Nothing was going to stop these deaths from playing out and sometimes he felt like the things he did to try to stop it might even hasten them. Once, he was gripped by a vision of the elderly omega woman who lived across the street, the one who ran the community kitchen, being caught up in a kitchen fire and perishing, so he’d done his best to convince her to stay home that day, only for her house to catch fire and her to perish there instead.

So instead he’d moved to suppressing the visions. He discovered a few years back that if he worked himself to exhaustion and deprived himself of sleep the smaller visions didn’t come as often, or at all. Not until there was a Death. The drawback was that by closing himself off the all the bumps and bruises type of visions, when a big vision broke through it was often chaotic and vivid, garish and hyper detailed. There was absolutely nothing he could do to stop the visions of death, which is how he knew that Jiyong was still alive out there somewhere.

He just couldn’t tell anyone that.

Doc finished cleaning the jagged bite mark on Hanbin’s shoulder, stitching it shut quickly and taking a pressure injector out of one of their drawers of meager medical supplies. He took it and injected five quick shots of antibiotic around the circumference of the wound. Tossing the spent injector into a recycling bin that would be picked up by Committee Officials at the end of the month for refilling, he turned his attention to Hanbin’s shattered wrist. He tutted at the swelling, the bruising, and the odd angle at which the appendage was bent.

He opened a storage closet and lugged out the ancient portable x-ray machine. He set about draping Hanbin and himself in protective clothing and took a few quick scans. Smiling apologetically when Hanbin swore gently as the old alpha adjusted his arm on the table. The scans uploaded quickly and Doc hummed gently under his breath in understanding.

“It’s just one clean break, thankfully. If you’re okay with a bit of pain I can set it now or I can give you a sedative and set it while you sleep.” Hanbin shook his head quickly. Sedatives brought on the visions almost worse than anything else. He avoided things like alcohol and medicinal teas as much as possible but pain medication was practically his mortal enemy at this point. Doc frowned at him again but laid Hanbin’s hand flat on the table. He took a firm grip on Hanbin’s hand and began to slowly pull, then gradually pull harder, and then harder still. Hanbin gasped against the pain and he felt the broken bone inside his wrist slowly slide and shift as the older alpha maintain traction until finally, just when Hanbin thought he was going to pass out, the bone slide back into the place. The splintered ends notched together and he choked on a scream. Doc slowly released the traction and then placed a splint to keep the bones from sliding apart again. Sweat broke out on Hanbin’s forehead and he felt like he was going to be sick.

Doc held out a tiny pill and patted him on his non-injured shoulder.

“Take the sedative, son.”

 

\-----☽✮☾-----

 

_October 10th, 2395_

_Village of Haedoji_

_The Shore Pack_

 

 

 “Namjoon!” A voice called as he entered the living room. He kicked his boots off by the front door, having just finished his rounds. His father was being difficult as per usual, sending him word this morning that he needed him to patrol the northwestern border of their territory as opposed to his usual eastern route. His father’s goons had forced him out of bed and away from his mate before the sun had even risen. As Scout Master, Namjoon found it particularly annoying. He didn’t need anyone, not even the Pack Alpha, to tell him how to do his job. His scouts were all well trained and more than capable of patrolling the routes Namjoon assigned to them, but Shihyuk insisted that there had been reports from the farms out that direction that needed extra attention so rather than argue, Namjoon had simply kissed Seokjin goodbye and spent the day patrolling along the river that marked the edge of their territory.

Now, he was annoyed to find that he wasn’t alone in his own home. Someone was waiting for him yet again. This time it was his younger sister and he huffed as he walked past her towards the sink, pointedly ignoring her. He ducked his head under the faucet, rinsing the film of sweat from his skin. It was mid-October, but the weather was unseasonably warm. And while that was great for those trying to finish the harvest before the first frost set in, he couldn’t help but long for a respite from the intense summer heat. That respite would be a short lived few weeks before the glacial winter set in like it did every year, but he would enjoy the mild heat and cool breezes while he could.

He shook his head, spraying water droplets across the kitchen.

“Gross.” Kyungmin sulked, wiping a stray drop of water from her cheek. “Do you always behave like this when you have guests?”

“I don’t usually have guests. Most people know when to leave me alone.”

She rolled her eyes. “Dad’s called a Pack meeting.”

Namjoon shrugged. “So?”

“Mom says you have to come.”

He sighed, frustrated.

“What’s it about?”

“I dunno. Mihee’s been driving everyone in the kitchen’s crazy, though.”

Mihee was his father’s First Mate, the Head Omega. If she was all riled up it must be something big. “And why do I have to go?”

“Dunno. But mom says-”

“Mom says I have to come, yeah, I heard you the first time. Is that all?”

She shrugged, “I du-”

“You don’t know. Got it. Where’s Jin?” He wasn’t in the house, he could tell that much by how weak the omega’s scent was.

“I dunno. He left like right after I got here, about twenty minutes ago. Beomgyu came and got him.”

“So he went to the Temple?”

“I du-”

“What do you know, exactly?” He asked, running a hand over his face.

“I know you’re a jerk and I know that Dad said everyone has to be at the Speaking Rock at sunset.” She pouted, sticking her tongue out at him as she got up from the kitchen table. She snatched a pastry from a plate as she shrugged on her coat. “Jin left this for you but I’m taking it since you suck.” She shoved it in her mouth and flounced out of the kitchen. The front door slammed behind her and he moved to the window to watch her stomp her way up the dirt road toward the village in the distance. The best thing about having chosen to build his house out on the peninsula was that no one could sneak up on him.

It also meant he could avoid all the going-ons of the Pack, but his parents had caught on to that a while back and started sending his kid sister after him. Three years younger than him, she was all beta and all brat. She still lived at home with his mother, their father’s Second Mate, and had yet to pick her Calling or her Devotion. She had plenty of suitors as the Pack Alpha’s daughter but she had little interest in a mate. Her only true hobby seemed to be annoying the shit out of Namjoon and now that it was a parent approved activity she seemed to volunteer for it at every opportunity.

He turned to the bread box and pulled out the pastry Seokjin had hidden for him there. He smiled to himself as he bit into the sweet, flaky bread. The apple filling was tart and the cinnamon was heavenly. His mate’s primary Calling might be that of a Healer, but he was wickedly talented in the kitchen as well.

Upstairs, he took a quick shower. He debated on just going to the meeting in his dirty work clothes, but he figured he’d pushed his father enough lately, and his mom had asked him to go… so he pulled out a nice change of clothes and dressed quickly. He ran a comb through the white blond of his hair and slipped on a clean pair of boots. No matter how many times he told Seokjin to leave it, the omega always managed to clean and polish his boots before Namjoon could get to them first. He always had a clean pair of shoes to put on after a day of tromping through the forest.

He stopped at the mirror in the upstairs hallway and adjusted his collar. He paused and then left the collar of his shirt open one button past what most people might consider to be appropriate, but it left the stark black of his mating mark at the base of his neck on full display. Created by applying an antiseptic paste colored by black ash to the bite right after it is administered, the tattoo of sorts marked him as a mated alpha, much to his father’s displeasure.

Pretty much everything Namjoon had done for the past five years had been to his father’s displeasure. His relationship with Seokjin just happened to be the one thing his father hated the most.

He grabbed his coat and shoved his hand into the pockets. The sun was just starting to descend in the sky and the retreating warmth was followed by that chill he’d been wishing for just an hour before.

He walked slowly up the lane leading away from his home, a cabin on a fertile spear of land, framed on three sides by the sea. The village of Haedoji, home of the Shore Pack and the oldest Taliian settlement in existence, sparked to life as the sun went down. Lanterns winked in windows and smoke poured from chimneys. Voices and laughter greeted him as he made his way through the outskirts of the village and into the heart of it. Near the center sat a ring of substantial packhouses, the homes of the Leading Families and where Namjoon had grown up. His own childhood home was actually one street over and much smaller, a single family home where he and his mother and sister lived until his twin half-brothers Yongguk and Yongnam presented and Yongnam proved to be an omega to his brother’s alpha. From that day forward Namjoon had been whisked into the main packhouse and raised to be Yongguk’s eventual second-in-command. Growing up as a member of the Saltwater Hearth, the most influential Hearth in the pack, had made him feel like he was invincible, but it had also been a lot of pressure.

Now, none of that mattered. His father has essentially disowned him. Disinherited would probably be a better term for it since he still liked to lord the ‘I’m your father’ bit over his head; all because Namjoon had dared to fall in love.

With a _useless_ omega.

As if Seokjin could ever be useless. Seokjin had been Namjoon’s Guidance Acolyte, assigned to him by the Temple to guide him through the tumultuous days of his youth. He was their most gifted Acolyte, their most powerful Touched, their most talented Healer. Two years older than Namjoon, he had been considered a perfect match given their individual high statuses. One was not supposed to fall in love with their Guidance Acolyte, it was taboo, a disgrace. It showed a lack of restraint on the Acolyte’s part and a lack of logic and good sense of the part of their Charge.

But the embarrassment of such a scandalous relationship wasn’t why Seokjin was useless in Namjoon’s father’s eyes. Seokjin was useless because he was infertile. There would be no pups in Namjoon’s future, and that was something his father refused to accept. So he’d given him an ultimatum. Give up Seokjin; or give up his status within the pack.

It had been the easiest decision of his life. He’d stepped down as the future Pack Second and accepted an entry level position with the scouts. Much to his father’s chagrin he’d risen quickly within their ranks and when the old Scout Master stepped down he’d named Namjoon as his successor. He’d built his home with his own two hands because his father refused to acknowledge his mating and refused to allow anyone else in the pack to help Namjoon establish his Hearth. If it wasn’t for the Temple of the Moon stepping in, the Butterfly Hearth still wouldn’t be acknowledged as an official Hearth of the Shore Pack.

Now, he kept to himself. He did his duty as a dedicated member of the pack and he lived a quiet life with his mate outside of the village proper. Every once and awhile his father would try to entice him back, but there was nothing that anyone could ever offer him that would make him give up Seokjin.

Beyond the homes of the Leading Families, the Temple of the Moon loomed. Lit by a silvery light, it overlooked the expansive courtyard that housed the village market. The courtyard was flanked on either side by the Great Hall where pack leadership conducted most of their business and the bathhouses, respectively. In the middle of the courtyard sat an ancient boulder. Worn smooth by decades of hands and feet, it was oblong and flat on top, large enough for three to four people to stand on at a time comfortably. Called the Speaking Rock it served as a central meeting place for the pack where anyone who had something to say could be easily seen and heard.

Most of the pack was already there when Namjoon arrived. There was a quite a bit of excited murmuring running throughout the pack, but Namjoon wasn’t interested in the local gossip. He stopped somewhere near the back of the crowd and settled in to wait.

Just as the sun hit the horizon, Shihyuk jumped up onto the rock and a hush fell over the gathered pack. Shihyuk looked for all the world like a pleasant sort of man. Someone sensitive, gentle, and young for one with grown pups- but anyone he knew him knew he was none of these things. He was the Prime, the one to who all the Taliian Alphas answered- and no one managed to dominate an alpha wolf who was use to being obeyed by being sensitive and gentle. A shrewd man by nature, he could be very controlling and didn’t relinquish power over anything easily.

The Prime held a hand down and helped a small omega with coppery hair onto the rock, followed by an alpha Namjoon immediately recognized as the leader of the River Pack.

Shihyuk stood, silent and proud, waiting until the excited whispers of recognition died down and he was sure that every eye was on him. When he had everyone attention he waited a beat more to collect his thoughts, and then he began to speak.

“I am speaking to you now as your Alpha. As leader of the Shore Pack, the village of Haedoji, and in the name of Tal, and her bonded Hae and Chugun, I greet you, my pack. I am pleased to welcome you all to this celebration. As many of you know, the Packs of this island share an intertwined history. Many years ago we were all of one pack. Many of us can count kin among the three main packs, the Mountain wolves, the River wolves, as those who live here by the Shore. However, kinship is not always enough to bind us together. As our numbers grow, resources become stretched thin. Saeloun is a fruitful land, but some past seasons have been rough. We have had to travel to the neighboring islands to hunt, and sometimes even to the mainland, at great peril to our alphas and betas. Today, we are fostering an alliance with the River Pack, our kin of the village Kangbyon. One that will let us share resources, hunting grounds, and the river and seas.”

Shihyuk squared his shoulders,

“Park Jinyoung of the River Pack, leader of the village of Kangbyon, Alpha of the Whirlpool Hearth, would like to present to us his son; Park Jimin of the River Pack, omega of the village of Kangbyon, seventh son of the Whirlpool Hearth. Omega Jimin has offered himself as a link between our two packs, a connection to foster a sense of family and a desire to support one another in times of trouble.”

Namjoon stood near the back of the crowd and looked at the young Omega closely. He couldn’t be very far past the time of his acolyte. Maybe a few months. So he’d hazard to guess that the boy was around nineteen, maybe twenty. He wondered who they were going to pair him off with. There hadn't been any whisper around the village, no secret bragging about an important mating for a favored son. Perhaps Yongguk was going to take him as a second mate, although that seemed foolish what with Himchan having just given birth to their first pup. He looked around, tried to see if anyone was making their way toward the stone, but he froze when his father spoke next.

“The Shore Pack would call upon Bang Namjoon, son of Bang Shihyuk, Alpha of the Butterfly Hearth.”

The silence that fell was deafening. Everyone remembered the terrible afternoon when Namjoon was stripped of his status and from that day forth went by his mother’s name of Kim. He hadn’t been Bang Namjoon in five years.

He didn’t move. This wasn’t happening.

His father was looking right at him, and he felt compelled to move. He may be an alpha in his own right, but his father was his Prime, and even eye contact was enough to make him comply.

Slowly, he approached the speaking stone. He stopped before it.

“My son is a strong alpha. He is smart, well versed in Pack leadership, and he has no suitable mate. A bond between him and the Omega Jimin would serve to tie the two leading families together. What says the River Pack?”

Park Jinyoung looked down at the silver haired youth before him. Even his pack had heard the news of the unusual circumstances surrounding the son of Bang Shihyuk’s Second Mate. When he had approached the Shore Pack, offering his only and most treasured omega child as a token of friendship and safety he had expected him to be given to the Prime’s heir, only to find out that the young alpha, Yongguk, had no intention of taking a second mate, not even for Pack politics. It was most unbecoming of a future leader, but he understood that a newly whelped omega could be sensitive and he didn’t want to send his treasured son into a mating in which there would be hostility.

Perhaps a union with one who’s mate was so unorthodox would be better. The mate of the young alpha before him was an acolyte, unable to have children and trained to deal with the problems of the pack, they would have the decorum, at least, to treat his son well, even if they didn’t necessarily welcome him with open arms. And besides, they needed this union. If they waited any longer his hand might be forced, and he couldn’t stand to see his most precious child mated to one of _them_.

“Yes.” Jinyoung spoke, “We accept your offer. Park Jimin accepts Bang Namjoon.”

Jimin took a small step forward and looked down at the alpha in front of him. While Park Jinyoung may have heard the rumors about the Prime’s son, Jimin, however, did not know of the strange circumstance surrounding the young man before him. He didn’t know that the alpha was being held there by the Prime’s hold on him or that he was already mated or that he seethed with anger at the thought of being mated to Jimin. All he saw was a handsome alpha with shining silver hair, luminous brown eyes, and golden skin that stretched over firm, smooth muscle. It was better than he had hoped for, really. He’d been afraid that he’d be handed off to some ancient Pack official. A novelty of a third mate, a beautiful face to show off and womb to fill full of pups. Perhaps with this man, with someone close in age, there could be some love between them... someday.

He tried to meet the alpha’s eyes. As he spoke, his soft voice carried over the crowd in a high, sweet tone. “In the name of Tal, I greet you Bang Namjoon. Thank you for welcoming me to this beautiful land, and accepting me into your midst. I promise to do my best to be a worthy mate. ” He looked expectantly at the alpha who still stood with his head down. Finally he raised his head and Jimin almost gasped at the anger he saw there. He saw the alpha glance at this father who stood to Jimin’s left before he growled out,

“In the name of Tal, I welcome you.” Then he turned on his heel and left.

Jimin started after him, trying to hide his shock.

Behind him, Shihyuk cleared his throat.

“In three days time there will be a full moon. On it we will hold a Promise Ceremony for the Alpha Namjoon and the Omega Jimin. At the summer meeting they will be united in full before the whole of the Taliian community, so that all shall know of their union.”

Park Jinyoung watched the young alpha storm away and hoped he’d made the right decision… for everyone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Come see me on twitter: [@vinniekpop](https://twitter.com/vinniekpop)
> 
> CuriousCat: [@climbingvines](https://curiouscat.me/climbingvines1)


	3. fly me to the moon, let me play among the stars

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always please forgive me my many typos, it's 3am and my eyeballs have ceased to function >.<
> 
> Warning for a potentially upsetting vision Hanbin has in the first few paragraphs. Violence, hooray!!

_October 4th, 2395_

_Wonju Compound_

 

 

Hanbin took the sedative.

He’d waited as long as he could but his arm was so swollen his fingers barely moved and he swore he could feel the shattered edges of his bones grating and splintered where they touched.

It’s only took about thirty minutes for him to fall asleep after that.

The dream started peacefully… it was a dream he’d had often before. He was in the city; inside the Walls. Buildings towered in the distance but he was in a park. They were in a park. Walking along the edge of a lake. Another boy was there with him, an omega. He could smell him.. Something like cinnamon and cloves, spicy and rich. He couldn’t make out anything about his face, but somehow he knew he was smiling at him. It made his heart race. When the boy reached out for his hand Hanbin yanked it away, startled. A sour note overtook the strange omega’s scent and Hanbin gasped as the scent of distress burned his nose. He turned and ran.

As he ran the scene changed into a new dream he’d never had before… it was dark and there were trees. There was only moonlight overhead. He was lying on his stomach in the grass, fear gripping every muscle. He urged himself to move but he couldn’t. There was a scream but it cut off in a gurgle.

His muscles felt like plaster cracking as he forced his legs to bend, his arms to lift… he followed the sound of sobbing.

The main gate to the compound was wide open. Outside the gate lay a body. Vacant eyes stared at the sky as a woman clung to their hand. She lifted her head and Hanbin choked when he met Eunju’s eyes. He couldn’t look down at the body. He couldn’t. He couldn’t.

He looked down.

Hyunsuk lay ground, his stomach tore open, entrails spilling on the ground. The eyes Hanbin had thought were vacant flashed to him and Hanbin tried to make eye contact, tried to see him through the tears. Hyunsuk tried to speak, blood gurgled at his lips but no words came out, and then he began to seize. The convulsions only lasted a moment and then he was still. His eyes were closed this time.

He could hear the voices of the pack cry out as they felt their connection to Hyunsuk severe and realized that their alpha had died.

Hanbin awoke with the pained cries of the pack ringing in his ears and knew that Hyunsuk was going to die.

Hanbin thought back to that day in the City Center, the people who congratulated Eunju on her alpha son. Today, looking into the face of the man who’d raised him, he didn’t feel strong. He didn’t feel like a protector. He felt like a coward. To afraid to say what he knew was coming because if they knew... if they knew he was Touched; cursed…

He felt like he was letting him die. He was going to try his best to keep it from happening, but in his heart of hearts Hanbin knew that if he didn’t say something, Hyunsuk would die. So he did his best to turn off that screen in his head, the one that replayed the dream over and over again just like the one that had displayed his five year old face against a velvety night sky, and and resolved to do everything he could to save the life of a man he knew was already gone.

He tried to warn him, when he saw him that morning, but there wasn’t a lot he could say to dissuade the older alpha from heading out into the woods, just as he’d done everyday since he was old enough to hold an axe. They were woodsmen, his pack. Their Compound supplied the Walls with lumber and the Walls provided them with safety, medicine, and other goods they couldn’t create on their own.

So that morning he got up like he did everyday and followed Hyunsuk and the other alphas out into the forest. He didn’t know when it was going to happen, he just knew that it would.

 

\-----☽✮☾-----

 

_October 6th, 2395_

_The City of Seoul; The Walls_

_19th Southern District; Gwanak-gu_

 

 

“Uncle Dongsoo is only sending me to the University in hopes of mating me away. It’s ridiculous.”

Taehyung kicked a rock as he passed by it. It skipped across the path through the park and skittered beneath a bush. It did absolutely nothing to dull the sharp edge of his irritation.

“What’s so ridiculous about it?” His cousin Miyeon retorted, “Mother and Father worked hard to raise you all these years, and it’s only fitting that you be properly introduced into the MATCH pool. In fact, it’s about time. You’re nearly twenty, after all.”

“I’m not anywhere near ageing out of the system yet, though you’d never know it hearing Aunt Doyeon talk.”

“Mother just wants—”

“To see me mated, and mated well. I’ve heard it a dozen times. She’s been like a mother to me in so many ways, for so many years. I hate to disappointment her, but it’s not like I’m not trying? I go to the service center and meet my matches every month. None of them are… right.”

“You could never disappoint her, Tae. Mother adores you.” Miyoung said, glancing to the side to catch her twin’s eye. “But I do think you’re being too picky. They’re your MATCHes for a reason, you know. If you’d give them more than an hour to prove it to you, you might find that you like one of them well enough…”

“Sure, I know.” Taehyung stomped on a twig as they passed it. The wood crunched under the sole of his boot; a bit more satisfying than kicking the rock had been.

It was true; his Aunt Doyeon and Uncle Dongsoo had taken Taehyung and his younger siblings in when they had no one else left to turn to. When he was very young, only six years old, the Compound he was born to was overrun by a group of Shameless. They'd turned everyone out, claiming everything the Compound contained as their own. His mother and father had been forced to walk three days to the Walls with Taehyung as well as Jonggyu and Eunjin who were barely more than toddlers. His mother caught the Virus, a deadly illness that threatened those who lived outside the Walls, and passed away shortly after arriving in the city, leaving his father to follow soon after. One day the man just never got up. People liked to say he died of a broken heart which Taehyung supposed was more optimistic than saying he just quit trying. Ever since then, his aunt and uncle raised them along with their biological children. Moonsoo, Miyeon, and Miyoung were more like siblings to him than cousins. And while his family might find his eccentricities when it came to finding a mate amusing and endearing, Taehyung knew the general populace would not be so indulgent.

“I bet you’ll receive at least five MATCH requests by the end of the semester,” Miyeon said with a smile. Outside of government assigned MATCHes, one could submit their own name to be tested against another’s. If the results came back with a high enough compatibility percentage, then a MATCH could be made. It was a common practice among higher status individuals to help keep their money ‘in the family.’

“I know I should be flattered to receive any requests at all, but honestly I...” He conceded, struggling to keep a hold of his sudden anger. “I won’t mate, not unless I find someone I can love. Someone who loves me so much in return that they won’t care whether I’m an alpha, a beta, or an omega. You know as well as I do that I won’t find a person who thinks that way inside the Walls. They don’t exist.”

Besides, hadn’t he already learned that lesson once? His blood boiled and his heart panged in a strange combination of emotion as he recalled the memory of his senior year two years ago and Choi Yonggeon, the youngest son of the alpha who managed their quadrant of the city.  
  
“I could never mate you, are you crazy?” Yonggeon had laughed, and Taehyung could still hear the scorn in his voice, see the contempt on his face. “I’m expected to have an heir. Sure, you’re a beta and your genes are superior, but I need a sure thing. I’ll make sure to MATCH with a type OB Omega and it won’t take us five years to have a single pup.” Yonggeon shook his head, “The fertility rate for male betas is too low. I’d be wasting my time on a mate like you.”

Miyoung drew Taehyung from his dark thoughts with a gentle pat on the wrist. “I’m not so certain a mate like that doesn’t exist. Besides, there is only one way to find out. Come with us to the University. Enjoy your semester. You might be surprised.” She guided them to sit on a shady bench. The two omegas sat on either side of him, their sugary scents, something like confectioners sugar and molasses, normally served to calm him but today his stomach refused to settle.

Taehyung nodded along as they continued to chatter about university and seeing friend’s they’d missed over the summer. It wasn’t like he had much of a choice. He knew he should be grateful for the chance to attend classes at all. His aunt and uncle could barely afford lessons for their three children, let alone adding in a fourth. But attending university was one of the best ways for lower status Citizens to find a mate outside of the MATCH program and it was considered essential if you wanted to move up in society.

There’d been no room for arguments; even promises to pick up extra shifts at the factory hadn’t swayed Uncle Dongsoo’s firm resolve to send him away. He’d accused Taehyung of spending far too much time with Mr. Cho, the single beta male who lived down the way and had chosen to pay the hefty tax every year rather than mate. His uncle reminded him that Taehyung could never live as Mr. Cho did. He was a beta, his uncle had repeated for the millionth time, and betas his age had a responsibility to find suitable mates and contribute to the fabric of society in a positive way.

While he had no choice but to do as his uncle wished, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t formulate a plan of his own. He knew what he wanted in life—independence, the freedom to make his own choices about his future.  
  
The approaching sound of shoes on gravel broke Taehyung’s reverie, and he raised one hand to shield his eyes from the glaring afternoon sun.

“Moonsoo,” both women said in unison as their brother rounded the corner and came into sight of the bench where they sat.

“I was sent to fetch you,” he said, scuffing the heel of his boot in the dirt. “It’s growing late and I’m to remind you we’re having a guest for dinner tonight.” The older omega regarded his sisters and cousin with a general air of suspicion. “What are you lot doing out here anyway?”

“Avoiding you.” Miyeon said primly. She stood up and smoothed her skirt. The twins were always the embodiment of fashionable. You’d never know that they created their outfits on a shoestring budget. They cut and styled their own hair, even pinched bits and credits to procure hair dye and cosmetics.

All in the name of finding a good MATCH, they told their mother, but he knew the girls just liked to dress up. Moonsoo, in comparison, was the definition of drab. A sullen boy, he lived in his factory jumpsuits, patched and frayed in places. He saved his ‘civilian’ clothes for special occasions, which was why Taehyung was immediately suspicious to see him in a pair of uncomfortable looking slacks and a button down.

“Who’s coming for dinner? Did Aunt Doyeon say?” He asked, eyeing his cousin as the older boy studiously avoided eye contact.

“Nope. I’m just suppose to get the three of you home quick enough for you to have enough time to be ‘presentable’, so get moving. She already had the greens on the stove.”

 

\-----☽✮☾-----

 

After a quick shower, Taehyung had discovered that his aunt had laid out his best clothes. A stiff pair of black trousers that itched his thighs and a silky shirt he thought might actually have been intended for one of the twins at first, judging by how low cut the neckline was. At the dinner table, he found himself tugging the material together whenever the breeze started to feel a bit too risque.

Their guest had arrived twenty minutes ago and Aunt Doyeon had sent Taehyung into the living room to serve tea while they waited for her to finish getting dinner on the table. Mr. Park was an alpha, probably older than his uncle judging by the loose skin around his jawline and the almost entirely grey head of hair, thinning along the temples and at the crown. He’d patted Taehyung on the head and commended him for being such a _helpful_ beta, but the pat had turned into more of a caress as the old alpha curved a hand over the crown of Taehyung’s head and he’d excused himself almost immediately.

Mercifully, Taehyung found himself seated beside Moonsoo, more than half a table’s distance from Mr. Park. He hated the stew his aunt made for dinner, the evening’s fare was what she made every time they had company. It was supposedly an old family recipe but really it was just a way to make their food stretch farther without giving away the appearance that they were struggling, but he barely noticed the food he pushed about his plate, so engrossed was he in avoiding looking in the elderly alpha’s direction any more than was necessary. Yet he couldn’t help but notice that his aunt’s head was frequently bent toward Mr. Park. Just what could Aunt Doyeon possibly be discussing so intently with the man?

“Mr. Park,” His aunt spoke up suddenly, her voice pitched to carry. “How is business?”

Mr. Park cleared his throat, a wet hacking sort of sound that made Taehyung cringe.

“It’s good, very good. Most successful general store in the quadrant, no one wants to spend their credits anywhere else. Everything a person could need, under one roof.” The man boasted, “Thinking of expanding again. The second shop has done well enough and my dear alpha daughter has done her part in keeping it up, especially after her bearer died, may he rest in peace. He was my true MATCH no doubt about that.”

The man sounded genuinely sad to speak of his mate’s passing and Taehyung felt more than a little sorry for him. A true fondness in a MATCH was about all anyone could ever ask for, and it sounded like there might have even been a little bit of love there.

“A pity you never had more children.” His aunt said, her tone sympathetic. “You’ve had to pay the fine, haven’t you?”

Mr. Park nodded, “Our reproduction quota called for an alpha and a beta, but my poor Kyuhyeok just couldn’t do it. It’s hard for betas, you know? Their DNA is so essential to our way of life, but their fertility rates are low. He just never managed to fall pregnant again.” Mr. Park cleared his throat again and Taehyung tried not to flinch. “In any case, I’ve reached an agreement with MATCH Panel and they’ve agreed to give me an adjusted quota if I were to MATCH again, just a single beta child and they’ve said they’ll even pay me back half the fines we paid for not meeting the quota the first time. A wonderful deal, really. It would allow me to open the third location and having a mate again would mean having someone to watch over the store while I’m gone setting up the new one…”

Aunt Doyeon tutted in agreement. A heavy silence fell over the table, as if everyone was waiting for someone else to speak. Uncle Dongsoo took a loud sip of his water before sitting it down with a put upon sigh.

“What did you say your genotype was again, Soogeun? Type AB?”

Mr. Park hummed in confirmation. “My dear Kyuhyeok was a Type AO. They wanted another AO out of us, but the Panel agreed to even a Type BB if I were to take a new mate.”

“Why, Taehyung!” His aunt gasped, her exclamation of surprise sounding like the most insincere thing he’d ever heard in his life. “That’s compatible with your genotype! You should submit a MATCH request. You might be just the thing Mr. Park is looking for.” She smiled at him, her lips stretched wide in false glee. Taehyung stared at her in shock. He knew his mouth must be hanging open. The light breeze from the open window made the collar of his shirt flutter and he was all to aware of the passage of air over his exposed clavicles.

“I’d rather not?” He tried. His aunt’s face tightened and his uncle made eye contact with him, his eyes flicking to Mr. Park and back like he was trying to communicate to Taehyung with only his eyes that he shouldn’t be embarrassing them like this. “I’m sorry...you seem very nice but I’m not interested in taking a mate just yet. I’m supposed to be going to University in the spring, you see, and-”

“Ah but it wouldn’t hurt to at least get checked? Find out if your compatibility is high enough for a MATCH? Besides, you’ve never really wanted to go to school anyway and-”

“Doyeon…” His uncles said sharply, taking her hand in his. “What your aunt is trying to say, Taehyung, is that it’s never a bad idea to explore all your options when they’re made available to you. This might be a good MATCH for you, Soogeun is a wealthy man. He would take good care of you and you children.”

“And if you really want to go to University, Taehyung-ssi, I have no problem with allowing you to take a few classes before any children are brought into the picture.” Mr. Park smiled at him, “Accounting and Bookkeeping. Part of being my mate will involve helping me run the family business, of course.”

To his side Miyeon squeaked. Miyoung was covering her mouth with her hands, shock emanating through her scent in waves. Moonsoo reached under the table and gripped Taehyung’s knee, whether to support him or to warn him not to do anything rash, Taehyung couldn’t tell.

“This was all a set up, wasn’t it?” Taehyung asked slowly. “That what this entire dinner was about, right? Me meeting him?”

Mr. Park seemed oblivious to the tension in the room. “I’ve heard a lot about you over the years, Taehyung-ssi. You’re aunt and uncle thought you’d be a good MATCH for me. So what do you say? We could head down to the Service Center tomorrow and-”

“Absolutely _not_ !” Miyeon gasped. “He doesn’t even _know_ you!”

“Miyeon!” Her mother shrieked, “This doesn’t concern you…”

“Mother, this is ridiculous!” Miyoung shrieked right back, coming to both Taehyung and her twin’s aide.

“Mother, perhaps this is a bit sudden…” Moonsoo tried, his voice level as always but Taehyung could see how the corners of his mouth were turned down.

Mr. Park was beginning to frown as well, looking back and forth between Doyeon and Dongsoo in confusion.

“Enough!” Dongsoo shouted. And Taehyung agreed. He’d had enough. He stood from the table, his chair falling back against the floorboards with a resounding clatter as he stormed away.

He slammed the door to the room he shared with Moonsoo and Jonggyu. Miyeon, Miyoung, and Eunjin shared the room next door, and the two rooms were joined by a tiny bathroom the six of them had to share. All of his siblings and cousins were omegas as was his aunt, Taehyung was the only beta and there were no alphas in their household save his uncle.

His aunt and uncle had been given a reproductive quota of one alpha and one beta. They hadn’t met it at all. Struggling to feed six children, after the addition of Taehyung and his sibling, along with having to pay their Reproductive Failure Fine, had put a lot of financial strain on the couple over the years, leaving them stuck in a home in one of the seedier parts of the city that they had long outgrown, with no visible way out.

He threw himself on his bed, groaning as the springs of the worn out mattress failed to give, digging into his side painfully. Moonsoo’s bed was shoved against the far wall and Jonggyu’s bed was crammed directly in the middle. The mixture of the other two boy’s scent was comforting to him, just like the twin’s was, and just like his little sister’s was. Jonggyu and Euijin were out of the house, thank goodness. At fifteen and seventeen they were still in high school, and that meant cram school. They would be at their after school lessons until right before curfew, stumbling into the house just before the city entered blackout and staying there until they had to rise for school the next morning.

Taehyung remembered those days, when all he had to worry about was his grades and how tired he was. He was glad they hadn’t been here to see this…

He flopped over in his bed, the stupid itchy trousers and the damn silky shirt. He unbuttoned his pants, kicking until they slide down his legs and landed on the floor with a plop. He worked at the tiny pearl buttons on the shirt, getting frustrated and tugging at the last couple until they popped free. He instantly felt bad. It was a nice shirt, one of the girls would have liked it. He scrambled off the bed in search of the missing buttons. He’d sew them back on and give it to one of them, probably Euijin, the girl was only fifteen but she was almost as tall as him. Everyone had thought she was going to be an alpha until she presented last year. Of course the family had known she was an omega, but outside of the initial announcement made in the City Center, the genotype of one’s children was something people tried to keep private among family and friends. It kept prejudice from forming, kept strangers from favoring one child over the other, and when it came to families like the Kims, it kept people from knowing that they’d failed to meet their reproductive quota, at least until all the children were old enough to present. And even then who’s to say the Panel hadn’t requested omegas of them? It was all about keeping up appearance here inside the Walls.

He flopped back on the bed in his boxers and screamed into his pillow. What were they thinking, trying to MATCH him up with an ancient alpha like that? He had plenty of MATCHes to consider, he’d get a new batch in the mail next month on the first. If they really wanted him to find a mate they’d sit down and go over those with him. Help his research them, figure out which ones were worth meeting and which ones he’d reject. But his pseudo-parents had never expressed any interest in his MATCHes beyond letting him know _constantly_ that he was getting old for a male beta and that if he wanted to have children he better get a move on.

Which was frustrating to begin with because who said he wanted to have kids? He had the option to choose an omega or even another beta. The majority of his MATCHes were alphas, but there was the occasional omega and beta in his stack. When he filled out his paperwork at age fifteen when he became old enough to be enter into the MATCH database he’d specified that he liked men more than women and that his ideal mate was an alpha, but what did he know? He was a kid. He just wrote down what he thought was expected of him at the time. The older he got and the more he got to know alphas, the more he realized that maybe an alpha mate wasn’t going to be the right choice for him. Luckily the ‘preferences’ they had you write down were just that, preferences, and they made suggestions based off of highest compatibility percentage, so that meant he got MATCHes that embodied things he said he didn’t want in a mate as an impressionable teenager.

He heard the door to the girl’s room close. Moonsoo’s voice carried over through the bathroom wall but it was too low and too muffled for Taehyung to make out what he was saying.

Outside his bedroom door, he heard his aunt and uncle talking in the hall.

“We’re so sorry, Mr. Park. He’s always been just a bit willful.” His aunt apologized.

“Don’t worry, Soogeun, we’ll talk to the boy…” His uncle reassured the alpha.

“I don’t want to make him do anything he’s not comfortable with. I would rather have him as my mate willingly. He is very beautiful, isn’t he?”

“He takes after my sister.” His uncle said, grief still barely hidden in his voice even after all these years, though as time went on Taehyung had begun to notice a note of bitterness when he spoke about his mother as well.

“Well he’s definitely worth the price. You get him to agree to the mating and I’ll pay you triple what Lee is offering. 600,000 credits. An additional 100,000 if he births me my beta before the end of next year.”

Taehyung lay there on the bed, paralyzed by shock. They were…. Selling him? On the other side of the bathroom wall he heard his cousin’s voices stop abruptly. He wondered if they were listening, too.

“And your sure your insider can manipulate the results of the MATCH in our favor?”

“He’s been doing it for the wealthy and powerful for longer than you’ve been alive, Doyeon. No one will ever know the difference. It’s all a bunch of bullshit anyway. Kyuhyeok was my ‘ideal match’ and look where that got me? One pup and a lifetime of fees to pay off. Sure, I’ve managed to squirrel away enough credits no one would ever say I’m destitute, but I have to live like scum to keep up appearances… a beta pup will fix that once and for all.”

Taehyung could imagine the look of shame on his aunt and uncle’s faces. Imagined them glancing around their home in bitter disappointment like they were oft to do. He wondered if Mr. Park knew he’d touched a nerve there, if he’d done it on purpose to spurn them on…

“He’ll agree to it. He might not like it at first, but he’ll agree.”

The front door opened.

“Be sure that he does.”

And then it closed.

 

\-----☽✮☾-----

 

_October 17th, 2395_

_Wonju Compound_

 

 

Hanbin had seen animal bones before, but these were nothing like the skulls of the wolves the hunters brought back from the forest. These were much larger, their fangs huge, empty eye sockets absorbing the darkness around them. Even in death, stripped of their flesh, he thought they watched him with an intelligence greater than that of any animal he’d ever seen.

Hanbin liked to hang around with Doc. Something about being with someone who understood death and knew how to stave it off was soothing to him; so Hanbin was there when the hunters had returned from a visit to another Compound farther to the north. They’d dumped the skulls on Doc’s desk along with their story and left. Supposedly they were the skulls of the Shameless who tried to raid the northern Compound’s storehouses in their vile, unnatural wolf form, but Hanbin thought that was probably a lie. He’d worked alongside Doc Kwon long enough to know that anybody utilizing their wolf form usually shifted back on instinct once they lost unconsciousness. He’d never seen it in real life, because no one in the Wonju Compound would ever sink so low as to debase themselves like that, but he’d read about it in some of the old textbooks Doc kept on the shelf behind his desk. Books written when humanity was just beginning to get itself back under control, before the Committee realized what a danger shifting was to their fledgling society and put a stop to it.

He supposed that they could be Shameless who died so suddenly they didn’t have a chance to shift back, but he thought it was more likely they were the skulls of Rabid that they found in the woods, their twisted in-between forms long dead from exposure or illness or starvation, that the hunters brought home and made stories up about just to seem more impressive.

He reached out with a cautious hand to touch one of the skull, feeling the cool, smooth contours of the bone beneath his fingertips as they traced the beast's muzzle. He could practically feel the power that had once inhabited it. The weight of its body, the hot breath snorting from its nostrils, the sharp points of fangs that could pierce flesh more easily than most knives. He wondered what it was like to exist inside the body of a creature like this…

Like most every Citizen Hanbin had shifted only once in his life. Shortly after he hit puberty and presented as an alpha, just after his fourteenth birthday, his body began production of the catalyst cells that fueled a person’s ability to shift. Just like everyone else, it took exposure to those cells for his body to build up immunity to them, and once the number of cells circulating inside his body reached a critical level to where he could no longer manage them he was forced to change. It had been painful, terrifying, he’d felt like he was drowning and burning alive all at the same time. He’d screamed with a throat that felt like it would tear to shreds and then he’d passed out. His foster mother had found him and bravely administered the vial of rescue remedy she’d kept just for that day and he’d changed back. He’d never allowed himself to change again.

But sometimes he dreamed about it, some of his only true dreams. Dreams that didn’t predict the future but instead reflected the desires of his heart. Sometimes, in those dreams, he ran on four legs through the forest with more speed than he ever thought was possible. He ran down the mountains, over hills and through abandoned towns and cities, until he was racing along the edge of the Walls, towards a figure who stood in the distance and waited for him with open arms….

 

\-----☽✮☾-----

 

Hanbin was on watch duty tonight.

He patrolled from nine o’clock at night to six o’clock in the morning every Wednesday and Thursday. Usually the watch shift was boring. They patrolled the outside perimeter of the wall that surrounded the Compound. The wall wasn’t high, not as high as the Walls that surrounded Seoul. If he put his arms straight up in the air he’d still have to jump a good two feet off the ground for his fingertips to even graze the top. They ran all the way around the compound, a full ten miles in a choppy uneven circle. If he ran it, it would take him just under an hour. Walking it took him two. He made four complete circuits per watch. He and one other person, along with three other teams of two, walking at precise intervals.

Usually watch was boring, but tonight it wasn’t.

There was a jolt of fear as the howl of a wolf rent the darkness.

“Maybe it’s a wild wolf..” Hanbin whispered. Cheoljun was his partner tonight, and the beta’s eyes scanned the dark treeline to their right; flitting from one patch of shadow to the next. Compounders had no reason to fear wild wolves. The beasts would only attack if they were desperate. Hanbin could not recall the last time anyone had been hurt by one.

But the skulls back on the examine table in Dr. Park’s office had not come from wild wolves.

Months, even years could pass between the rare occasions the Rabid ventured into their land, and yet every time they did, blood was spilled. After his encounter with the Rabid out by the grove the other day… this was the first time the howl of a wolf had frightened Hanbin. Neither of them needed to say a word to know what they were both thinking. Hanbin’s wrist twinged inside it’s brace. His higher than average healing factor meant that the break was almost entirely mended something which he attributed to his Touched abilities based on his reading of Doc old textbooks, but not something he could discuss with anyone, so he worse the brace for appearances more than anything.

"It's probably not," Cheoljun whispered, but he gripped his rifle tighter with both hands and raised it to point in front of them, out into the dark expanse of the timberline before them. Guns were a luxury this far from the Walls, and only those who were trusted to be responsible with them were allowed to carry them on watch.

There was a rustling sound from somewhere in the deep underbrush.

Cheoljun swore suddenly, his fingers spasming like he wanted to fire but wasn’t sure if it was smart. Without speaking, he slowly turned the barrel of his gun. When Hanbin’s eyes finally followed it, he saw what had provoked the older beta. He grabbed Cheoljun by the back of his jacket and pulled him into the shadow of the wall, pressing back against the stone in an effort to camouflage himself in the darkness.

It was far down the timberline, so dark it could have been a shadow, but it moved with the grace of something otherworldly. It wasn't the creature's size - though Hanbin quickly realized it was far bigger than any wild wolf he’d ever seen - it was its gait that filled him with fear. It melted into the shadows like smoke, wove between the trees like black water, until before he’d even begun to comprehend what he’d seen it stood before them, just in the other side or the shadows where they hid. He knew then he wasn’t looking at a Rabid wolf, it’s shape was too natural, too easy. It was someone who had taken their wolf form willing, either a Shameless or a Taliian, although he’d never really understood what the difference between the two was other than one was a follower of heathen religion and the other had a penchant for violence.

He knew there were other civilizations - other peoples - out there, beyond the peninsula and over the mountains. Across the ocean. But the likelihood that one would be standing on their mountain? It didn’t seem like that would be the case.

The creature didn’t appear to have seen them, or scented them. It looked both directions along the timberline before raising its muzzle to the sky and howling a second time.

The experience was so surreal that Hanbin's fear couldn't help but take its leave of him for a moment as he stared in wonder at the beast. It was a childhood legend come to life. He felt a strange longing to watch it for just a moment longer, to see the way it moved again and hear that eerie howl erupt from its chest one more time. His curiosity drew him toward danger, but his fear was strong enough to pull him away from it. He knew as an alpha his first instinct should be to attack, to protect his people, but the gun slung across his back had only ever been fired at targets and there was no part of him that wanted to engage the terrible, frightening creature in front of him.

Any moment now the beast’s head would turn, the clouds would shift and it would see them standing in the moonlight just as clearly as they saw it. The wind would turn and it would smell them...

"Behind the wall," Hanbin whispered, so soft and so fast it was barely a hiss. "Stick to the shadows.”

They moved so slowly, they might as well have not been moving at all. Hanbin’s heart hammered in his chest and his breath wheezed in his lungs. He kept his jaw tense, his mouth clamped tightly shut for fear that even the sound of his terrified breathing would tip the wolf off. The whistle of his nose sounded piercingly loud as it bounced off the stone wall he pressed himself against as soon as they rounded the corner. For a few moments they were alone with the sounds of their terror. The beast was obscured from sight by the angle of the wall. All they could do was wait.

“We have to warn the others," Cheoljun breathed into his ear.

Hanbin nodded, unable to convince his legs to move.

It took a tug on his shoulder to finally make him follow after Cheoljun, crawling on all fours along the strip of shadow at the base of the wall in the opposite direction of where they’d last seen the wolf. Like before, they moved at an agonizingly slow pace, barely daring to let their bodies brush through the damp grass as it wet their palms and knees. They had only just cleared one stretch of the wall when the shape of the wolf dropped down directly in front of them.

Hanbin froze, swallowing a cry of shock. How did it manage to clear the walls like that? The beast was so close that even the shadows wouldn't hide them if it chanced to look their way. Cheoljun was ahead of him, rising slowly into a crouch, the rifle clutched in both hands.

Panic erupted in Hanbin's chest as he realized what Cheoljun was about to do. He couldn't tell him to stop. Even a whisper would alert the wolf. It would all happen within the space of a few seconds, and then they would be dead. If Cheoljun missed, the wolf would be on them before either of them could move and even now Cheoljun’s hands shook so badly that Hanbin could see the tremors in the weak starlight.

He reached for Cheoljun’s sleeve, he had no idea what he’d intended to do, but when he saw the beta’s finger press down on the trigger he _yanked_ forcing the barrel of the gun up and away from the wolf. The shot rang out, piercing the sky as the sharp report echoed through the compound. A cow in a nearby barn lowed in response as the wolf startled and snarled whirling on them, it’s claws raking up the soil as it turned.

It stood watching them for a moment, the hair along its spine rising as it bristled in anger. Then suddenly it posture relaxed and it almost seemed to smile. There was a shifting, a whirr of motion that seemed to be almost instantaneous and then there was a man crouching before them. He was smiling, a wicked smile of gleaming teeth and manic flashing eyes. He looked up at them through the fringe of his overly long hair, filthy and hanging into his eyes.

The man chuckled as Cheoljun yelped and aimed his gun at the his bare chest. Then he uttered one word.

“Run.”

And they did.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Come see me on twitter: [@vinniekpop](https://twitter.com/vinniekpop)
> 
> CuriousCat: [@climbingvines](https://curiouscat.me/climbingvines1)


	4. I sit by myself talking to the moon

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A quick note: In same-sex relationships the person who contributed their dna to the creation of the child is called the Sire and the person who gave birth to them is called the Bearer. A female alpha who contributed is refereed to as 'Isa' by their children and a male omega or beta who birthed a child is called 'Beba'. Mother and Father are used by male-female pairings. For example, Namjoon has a female omega mother and male alpha father, but Yoongi who is introduced later in that chapter has his male alpha Sire, aka his father and his male omega Bearer, aka his beba. 
> 
> Obligatory warning that it's 4am and I don't know what words look like anymore. :)

_October 10th, 2395_

_Village of Haedoji_

_The Shore Pack_

 

 

“I won’t do it.”

“You have no choice.”

“Let’s go to the Temple, then. Call the Heads together and let them hear you say that. Doctrine says I always have a choice. We are not Citizens, we choose our mates!”

Namjoon’s father slammed his hand down on his desk. “You’re being unreasonable, pup!”

“I’m not!” Namjoon snarled back.

The door to The Prime’s office was closed. Located on the topmost floor of the Great Hall, the thick oak door blocked sound and scent from reaching the floors below, and it was a good thing because the amount of aggressive pheromones rolling around the room was enough to ruin any submissive wolf for hours.

“They need this alliance, Namjoon. They came to us to strengthen that bond. The new Head Alpha of the Mountain Pack put a claim on the boy, would you have us send him to the Sangilions? I’m asking you to think of someone else for once, son. To think of your pack, to think of our allies! What will it hurt you to listen for once in your life? Why can’t you simply just obey?!”

Namjoon laughed, shocked and humorless. “You want me to take on a second mate! That’s not something you just _do_. It requires thought and preparation! Courting!”

“So Court him!” His father sighed, “But Namjoon, you _will_ take him as your mate. You need a strong omega by your side.”

“I have a strong omega by my side! I have Seokjin! Seokjin who has been my mate going on five years now.”

Shihyuk shook his head, like just by simply denying to words he could make them untrue. “He is not a good match for you, I never gave my blessing to that union. You went behind my back and mated him-”

“And then the Temple told you to keep your nose out of it! It doesn’t matter if you gave your blessing, Tal gave Her blessing! We’re True Mates. There is literally nothing you could ever have done to prevent that.”

“It makes no _sense_ that She would choose such a mate for you. What can he give you? You have no future with him! Your line stops with you- unless you take a second mate you’ve wasted your potential. You’ve denied the pack strong leadership in the future. You have a duty-”

“I’m sorry, I thought you said I would never be a pack leader? Isn’t that what you declared in front of the whole village? That I was no longer your son, no longer a Bang? You can’t have it both ways, _Shihyuk._ ”

Shihyuk growled, and Namjoon resisted the urge to curl his shoulders up around his ears.

“You will address me with respect! I am still your Sire. I am still the _Prime_ -”

The door cracked open and a small woman stepped in, head bowed in a show of submission.

“Mother-”

“Second Omega Yejin, leave us.” His father said sharply, dismissing his mate with a quick wave of his hand.

“Forgive me, Prime.” She bowed low, “I would speak to our son.”

“”You may speak to him later, we are discussing pack business.”

“My Alpha, the utmost respect, I would speak to him about the Omega Jimin.”

Shihyuk stared at his second mate, he was fond of her. Loved her even. But he couldn’t help but blame her for their son’s lax morals and thus she had fallen out of favor with him over the last few years. But perhaps if she could make the boy see sense.

“Then speak.”

Yejin bowed to him once more, then turned to her son. She smiled at him sadly, her strong son. So tall and handsome. She reached up, standing on her toes to cup his cheek.

“I would have you do this thing, Namjoon-ah.”

Namjoon let out a pained whimper, “Mother…”

“I worry for you, out there on that peninsula all by yourself. You and Seokjin both. You both work so hard. You both do more for this pack than you have to, than they deserve from you.  I ask of you as your bearer, your mother, to at least give the boy a chance. Tal gave us an endless capacity to love, but how will you ever find that love if you don’t go looking for it every once in awhile.”

“Mom, I can’t do that to Jin he’s-”

“Seokjin is a grown man. A strong omega. Make this decision with him instead of in spite of him. Including him will make this easier on all of you…”

Namjoon felt a rumblings growl work it’s way up his throat as he gathered his mother close, lifting her off the floor entirely as he hugged her. She laughed against his cheek and he grunted in response.

“Only for you, mom. Only for you…”

He sat her down and she patted his arm, wiping tears from her own eyes.

“See, that wasn’t so hard.” She said, straightening her robes and turning back towards her mate, “Alpha.” She bowed in acknowledgement. The door clicked shut behind her. Namjoon and Shihyuk locked eyes.

“If you do this for me, pup, I’ll make you a deal. I’ll acknowledge Seokjin as your mate. Your _second_ mate; behind the Omega Jimin. I’ll also give you your status back. You’ll be welcomed back into the family with open arms. Any children you have will be acknowledged as my grandchildren. I can’t promise you the position of future Second-in-Command back, but you’ll have a seat on the pack council with the other First Sons & Daughters. Do we have a deal?”

Namjoon bared his teeth at his father but he nodded.

“I’ll let Acolyte Sunmi know that we’re going ahead with the ceremony.” His father said.

Unlike his mother, Namjoon slammed the door when he left.

 

\-----☽✮☾-----

 

Those who are Called to serve the Moon as Acolytes of Tal are expected to sacrifice much. They become almost like the property of the community. Perhaps the biggest sacrifice a Acolyte makes in the ability to have children, but they gain something in return. Healing abilities, prophetic dreams, power to influence the wind and rain, manipulate plant life, control animals, the list was endless.

Choosing to serve the Moon is not all sacrifice. Acolytes are an integral part of the fabric of Taliian society. No one has higher status than an acolyte in a pack save the Head Alpha themself. Respected, adored, and sometimes feared, acolytes fill many roles. And though the practice is uncommon, they sometimes take a mate, and if they find themselves unhappy with their choice to Serve they are free to leave the Temple of the Moon. They can even adopt children and raise them as their own, within the walls of the Temple or without.

Training to be an acolyte included many trial such as periods of abstinence, periods of silence, periods of isolation, periods of fasting, and periods of forgoing sleep; these methods were used to cull the weak and to learn to communicate with the pantheon, to find answers in them. After a time one learned to induce the proper state of openness at will, without having to rely on something like severe hunger or thirst to open the necessary pathways in their mind

“Be wary of the Mother’s Gifts.” Old Mija had said, when Seokjin was only twelve years old, newly presented as an Omega. “They put you in Her debt. With a gift as strong as yours, she must a have a purpose in mind for you. No gift is given without obligation. Remember this: you follow the destiny Tal laid out before you. You did not need to be Called to follow it. You were born to it. But you will be tested. You were given too much. You will suffer for your gifts, but it is your destiny. Suffer through the trials to see what is at the end of the path, Seokjin.”

When Seokjin was fifteen when Old Mija died, but not before she named him the next Head Acolyte of Tal, the leader of the Temple of the Moon. Seokjin, who Spoke for the Moon. Seokjin who many thought embodied everything an omega should be. Beautiful, strong, healing, maternal, and wise. Raised in the Temple his whole life, of course he would be the next Head.

But there were those inside the Temple who did not live to Serve. Those who chose the Path of the Moon not because they were Called to it, but because they sought the status and the renowned that it brought. The Temple would have the people believe that all who are Touched are chosen by the Mother to Serve Her, but Seokjin had seen into the black heart of his people and he knew this to be false. People were people, Touched or not. They could be good or bad. Selfish or selfless. Quick to anger or infinitely patient. Prone to fits of jealousy and paranoia or naive and trusting. People were people. And in the days after Old Mija’s death there were those people tried to use his age against him and they won.

Garam was Old Mija’s closest advisor. She was a cunning and shrewd woman who very quickly managed to rally a circle of supporters behind her in the days after her mentor’s death. Stifling the spread of Old Mija’s final words, she installed herself as the Head Acolyte of Tal, stating her position was only temporary, until Seokjin was old enough and mature enough to take up the mantle for himself.

No sooner had she done so, did the Moon renounce her. Speaking through Seokjin, Tal predicted the ambitious woman’s death, and Garam rebuked him, calling his words false and casting him from Tal’s Sanctum.

Seokjin did not mind.

He never wanted to be the Head. All he had ever wanted was to Serve and Serve well. Taking up a position in the Temple of Kongang & Uihak, he settled in to live the life of a Healer and nothing more.

When Seokjin was seventeen, Hyori, Garam’s advisor, came to him and told him he had been chosen to be a Guidance Acolyte.

When a person reached the onset of puberty they ‘present’. An Omegas present with a raging fever, Alphas with an uncontrollable fit of rage, and Betas with a very strong, persistent headache- all accompanied by the sudden influx of Scent; their own personal essence by which people can learn to identify both them and their dynamic. A person’s dynamic could be known before then with a simple physical examination or a blood test, but in Taliian culture it is traditional to wait until Tal wishes their dynamic to be known.

After a young wolf presents, a presentation ceremony is held. Between their presentation ceremony and the big communal Coming of Age ceremony at the Summer Meeting, young wolves are not to be alone with already presented wolves of other dynamics. While a person may choose a mate from among those who share the same dynamic as them, young people that share the same dynamic are not as affected in the same way by each other’s pheromones and hormonal shifts. These newly presented youths are considered to be in a very vulnerable state, no longer children, but not quite adults. According to tradition, they need a chaperone to keep them safe until they are assigned an acolyte to help guide them as they become a fully grown member of the pack.

Taliians considered it to be their sacred duty as a community to ensure that the first experiences a young wolf has after presentation are safe, appropriate, and educational. It is felt that all young people; alphas, betas, and omegas- need to learn how to appreciate each other, how to recognize a potential mate, and how to recognize when a relationship isn’t a good match for them. Once they are older and of an appropriate age, they were taught how to deal with the more intimate layers of their dynamics. Learning how to guide each other through heats and ruts is a very important part of their guidance. Older, more experienced individuals are needed guide them, but they have to be people with which there is little risk of the inexperienced wolf getting attached.

Therefore Acolytes are the ones who take on the duty of educating the younger generation. Each newly presented wolf is matched with an acolyte a few years older than them who is of a complimentary dynamic and they stayed paired until the young wolf reaches the age of majority and is free to begin seeking a mate of their own.

The acolytes are kind and discreet. They act as both teacher and confessional, keeping secrets and placating fears. Later, once their Charge is of age and they express an interest in it, their relationship might develop a sexual component, as Acolytes are safe to experiment and learn with. The relationship between and Acolyte and their Charge is supposed to be a temporary one, however. It is a Rite of Passage for all young wolves who live in the islands to receive their Guidance Acolyte. And it is the Acolyte’s responsibility to make sure their Charges do not form a lasting attachment to them while also maintaining the air of someone they can trust, which can sometimes be difficult. It is not uncommon for a Charge to become infatuated with their Guidance Acolyte, but the responsible thing to do is for the Acolyte to cease contact with them once their period of service is over in order to help the Charge direct their misplaced feelings towards a more productive relationship.

It is the final stage of an acolyte’s training to become a Guidance Acolyte, and something most look forward to, but Seokjin had not been looking forward to it.

The Coming of Age ceremony that year at the Summer Meeting had saw him walking around the fire to meet the young alpha assigned to him, and he’d been surprised to find Bang Namjoon standing there; the First Son of the Head Alpha’s Second Mate. Future Pack Second to his brother Yongguk, Heir Apparent of the Shore Pack.

He hadn’t know it then, standing there looking at that gangly fifteen year old boy, but Seokjin had met his mate that day.

Seokjin opened his eyes. He unfolded himself from his prostration in front of the altar, the beautiful backdrop of stars and galaxies flickering in the candle light, a large opal rested on an elaborate stand, rotating slowly, it’s surface carved to mimic the surface of the moon.

He’d come to the Temple hours ago, anxious and jittery. Something was coming.

He’d hoped being in the Temple would allow him to Speak, let him know what was going to happen. Beomgyu hovered somewhere behind him, a thick leatherbound book in his hands, a pen poised to write down and True Words that might spill from Seokjin’s lips.

None came.

Voices came from the Sanctuary, the main hall and large common area where services were held, the faithful came to make offerings, and people came to wait to see their friends and relatives healing in the recovery ward.

Something has happened.

With a practiced grace, Seokjin rose from his place on the floor of the tiny prayer chamber, popping his neck and his back as he went. Beomgyu tutted at him but Seokjin only gave him a small smile. The young acolyte was barely old enough to have been Called, having just presented last year. Assigning him to Seokjin had been Hyori’s idea. The boy’s ability was mostly manifesting in a disturbingly accurate memory, so subtle that the Temple hadn’t even been sure if he should count as Touched or not at first. As it was, the boy bore a single crescent moon on his cheek, the first phase of his Journey mapped out for everyone to see. Seokjin himself wore every phase of the moon, tattooed across the sharp line of his cheekbone and accented with careful lines that indicated his Devotion to the healing arts.

Beomgyu took his assignment to Seokjin seriously, and Seokjin in turn thought his dedication was nothing short of adorable.

The voices got louder, more excited.

Seokjin opened the door and stepped out into the Sanctuary.

It took a moment for the acolytes gathered there to take notice of him, but when they did they all fell silent. Everyone was looking at him, which was unusual because these days his fellow acolytes would prefer to pretend that he didn’t exist.

There was a snort, and then a peal of harsh laughter.

Garam stepped out of the crowd, her smile sharp and gleeful. There was nothing kind about it, and so he narrowed his eyes, waiting.

“You don’t even know, do you?” She sneered. The woman was older than him by at least a decade, but she was childish. She was good at hiding her flaws, however, and if there had been a non-acolyte present she never would have dared to speak to him that way. As the spiritual leader of the village she had to maintain her otherworldly appearance. But behind closed doors it was apparent there was nothing holy about the woman.

“I’m afraid I don’t. I’ve been meditating for the last few hours…”

Garam rolled her eyes. “The Alpha called an all pack meeting. Of course you wouldn’t go.”

There was a chorus of tisks and murmurs highlight just how ‘disrespectful’ Seokjin’s behavior was from Garam’s lackies.

“I was in seclusion. No one would dare interrupt me while I was speaking with The Mother. I was not informed.”

At his words, the acolytes quieted; glancing about nervously like Tal herself would come out to scold them for their behavior.

Garam scoffed, “Well you missed some rather interesting news. We have guests from the River Pack. There’s to be a Promise Ceremony, between Head Alpha Park’s omega son and a very lucky alpha…” Her smile had that sharp, hateful quality to it again and Seokjin felt a whisper crawling up his spine. Something was most definitely wrong… “I’m sure he’ll make Namjoon very happy.”

 

\-----☽✮☾-----

 

Seokjin left the Temple behind, the silvery lights fading the farther he walked down cobbled streets. From inside open doorways and cracked windows he could hear the excited voices of the Shore Pack.

“The River Pack has always been our allies, that true, but with this kind of blood bond imagine the benefits!”

“I wonder if they’ll allow us a share in their hunting grounds, and it would be nice to be able to course farther up Mid River without worrying about passing into their territory.”

“Yes, but that means we’ll have to let them come Down River and fish the sea at the Mouth now…”

“You know they have their own fishing grounds at the Throat, why would they ask for access to our portion of the seas?”

“For the same reason you want to ask for access to their hunting grounds.”

Seokjin pulled his coat closer around himself as he walked, heading through empty streets and past darkened shops. The edge of the village proper loomed before him and the houses started to have larger gardens, the sounds of chickens and the belting of goats mixed in made the voices harder to hear as the houses got further and further from the street.

There weren’t many large farms out on this side of the village, but this was were the fisherfolk tended to build their packhouses, smoke houses and strings of fish hung high to dry, a weaving rack showing the diligent repairs someone had most likely been making to a net before they’d been called away to the pack meeting. Then the cobbled street ended and became more of a path, a simple rut in the road that wound down the slope for a way and then sharply up, leading to a cabin situated high on the rocky outcropping of the peninsula that extended into the sea.

He couldn’t tell from here but it appeared that there might be a single candle flickering in the downstairs window.

He lengthened his stride until he was moving at a brisk jog, making his way up the path with more urgency now that he was far from the prying eyes of nosy packmates.

He rounded the corner and, yes, there was a light in the living room. Around the side of the house a small cottage stood, the windows dark. A sprawling garden filled the space in between the two, bathed in comforting moonlight. He hesitated for just a moment before going inside the main house.

He stripped off his coat and his outer robes, hanging them in the foyer. Sliding his feet into a pair of waiting slippers, he made his way into the living room.

Namjoon sat there, a single stubby candle lit casting barely enough light for Seokjin to make out his features, but he didn’t need to see his face to know that his mate was upset. The sharp, acrid sting of his betrayal and anger were obvious without even a single verbal or physical cue from the distraught alpha.

Silently, Seokjin made his way to where Namjoon sat on the worn couch and sank to his knees at his feet. He wrapped his arms around the alpha’s legs, resting his cheek against a powerful thigh. A strong hand immediately came to rest on Seokjin’s head, fingers combing through the silk of his hair in agitated swipes. Seokjin closed his eyes and did his best to envelope them in a soothing cloud of omega pheromones.

Minutes passed, and he thought that perhaps Namjoon wasn’t going to say anything, that he would have to pry it out of the stubborn alpha, but then the hand running through his hair slipped down to his neck and gripped his nape. Seokjin felt his body go limp as his alpha scruffed him, a floating feeling of acceptance and willing submission that he gladly gave himself over to.

“You heard?” Namjoon asked, his voice carrying a rough note that let Seokjin know he’d been shouting.

He nodded slowly, feeling the way Namjoon’s fingers massaged into his nape as the alpha loosened his grip.

“Are you upset?”

“If Tal wills it…”

“Dammit Seokjin, that’s not an answer!” Namjoon growled, hauling the omega off the floor and into his lap in a show of alpha strength. He gripped Seokjin by his chin, lifted his face so that their eyes met. His touch was gentle, his thumb smoothing along the curve of Seokjin’s jaw. “Are you hurt by this?”

Seokjin stared into his mates eyes. He couldn’t help the frown that began to tug at the corners of his mouth. “To love is a Blessing… but you don’t love him.... You don’t even know him… it’s blasphemy, what they are trying to do....”

“Seokjin, does it _hurt_ you?”

His lip trembled and he chided himself for being weak, for being selfish. Jealousy was considered to be crass and unreasonable in their culture, there was nothing to be jealous over that couldn’t be solved with conversation and the proper action.

“It hurts me…” He choked out past the fast growing lump in his throat. “They didn’t even ask me… I’m your mate, whether they like it or not. Even a third mate gets to voice their opinion if their mate want to take a fourth. It’s always been just you and I, I should have been consulted.”

“And what would you have said? If they had asked you?” Namjoon asked, resting his forehead against his mates.

Seokjin took a deep breath, “First I would ask ‘Why do they want this union?’, because there has to be a reason behind it.”

“My father says that they’re looking to strengthen the bond of our alliance through blood. He said that the Mountain Pack asked for Jimin, the omega, and that his father brought him here instead.”

“So this union is to serve as a sort of asylum for him? You’re to protect him?” Seokjin frowned. Forcing an omega to mate against their will was blasphemy, a submissive wolf always had the final say- no matter what. It was Tal’s Will that it be so. “What would they do if you say no? Would they send him to Sangil?”

Namjoon growled in frustration, “I don’t know. If it was as simple as rejecting the alpha’s claim, then they would have done so, don’t you think? There must be something else driving them to seek an alternative match for the omega. The Mountain Pack… something is wrong. They’ve always been difficult. I mean, given our history it’s no surprise that we’ve never seen eye to eye, but lately they have become so much more bold. Just last week I was called out to one of the farms closest to the Far River. Someone had poached more than five of their herd of cattle in the night. Yoongi and I tracked the poachers all the way to Far River and it was obvious that they had crossed over. Either someone was going through great lengths to fool us, or it was the Mountain Pack. We even kept an eye out for someone selling an unusual amount of hide or taking less of their portion of meat here in Haedoji, but nothing suspicious ever turned up.”

“So you think the Mountain Pack would try to come for Jimin if his father refused them, the same way they’re sneaking across our borders poaching livestock?” Seokjin asked, disgust creeping into his tone at the very idea.

“I’m saying that we haven’t seen a Sangilion omega at the summer meeting in almost eight years. Something isn’t right on that mountain top… who knows what’s going on up there.”

“So that's it then, isn’t it? We can’t reject him. Not if it means he’s going to be in danger.”

“I don’t have to reject him, but I don’t have to mate him either. Going through with the Promise Ceremony should be enough. Another alpha making a Claim might be enough for the Mountain Pack to lose interest. It’ll also give the kid enough time to find a mate he actually wants to be with.”

Seokjin made a face, “How old is he?”

“I have no idea. Younger than me. Doesn’t look old enough to have been more than a year out of his Guidance period. Definitely too young to be resigning himself to a life as someone's second….” He trailed off, suddenly remembering the conditions his father had put into place if he were to agree to a union with Omega Jimin. “Jin-ah…. There’s something else I need to tell you…”

Namjoon quickly recapped his conversation with The Prime. When he finished Seokjin was silent. So silent Namjoon was beginning to wonder if the omega had fallen asleep where he lay slumped against his chest. Then there was a wet sound, somewhere between a chuckle and a sob.

“Well that it then, isn’t it? We really have no choice. Between potentially saving his life and having our union finally be acknowledged by the pack what other choice are we supposed to make here?” He laughed, shaking his head. “Is he pretty?”

Namjoon looked down at Seokjin, aghast. “I have no idea. I barely looked at him.”

Seokjin snorted, “Be honest. If I’m going to be playing second mate and nanny to his pups they better at least be pretty babies.”

“Stop that. I’m not going to mate him, and he’s definitely not going to be having any pups, at least not mine.”

“But then at least you’d have pups.” Seokjin scoffed.

Namjoon took him by his shoulders, pulling him up so that they were eye to eye once again.

“Listen to yourself, you sound ridiculous." He said furiously, "Jin, you know it was you who spoiled me for other omegas. I was just barely presented as an alpha and you were the most exciting person I’d ever met. Even before they chose you as my acolyte, I dreamed of you. Just from the glimpses of you I had from across the temple courtyard or at ceremonies... and I know I wasn’t the only one. All of the young alphas dreamed of you, but I was the one whose dream came true. Even though it was forbidden. Even though it was wrong for me to feel the way I felt about you, the way I _feel_ for you. I couldn’t get enough of you. I wanted you for my whole life and as much as you fought it, you wanted it, too. We defied everyone and everything to be together. I loved you, Seokjin. I still love you. I will always love you. I’ve never regretted a moment of loving you. Even afterward, when father was so mad and he threatened to send me away to stay with another pack. Even when we ran away and marked each other and they threatened to keep us apart to break the bond, and they would have, too, if the Temple hadn’t stood by us. I didn’t regret it when no Hearth wanted us and I had to make our home with my own two hands. Not even when I was stripped of my status and my father’s name.

No one else has ever come close to you. I wanted you for a Mate from the very first minute I spent in your presence. I wanted, and still want more than anything, to spend the rest of my life with you. I thank Tal for you every day, Seokjin. I would do it all again, and more. A child wouldn’t change that. I never expected that because I always knew if it was you I really wanted then children wouldn't be a part of the tapestry of our lives. And besides, if I really wanted a child there are other ways that don’t involve me taking a second mate.

This Omega? He isn’t going to change anything. This is something that I have to do, though, something that I owe my mother, something that my father has demanded of me like he’s never demanded anything of me before. I have to do this.”

Seokjin’s shoulders shook with barely restrained sobs. His hands reached up and gripped Namjoon’s hair roughly as he furiously replied. “He is innocent in this, this omega they’ve brought from the River. He’s a pawn. Be kind to him, Namjoon. Don’t hurt him. Be good to him and make him feel welcome. He’ll be a part of our Hearth, for now. We owe him that much.”

 

\-----☽✮☾-----

 

_October 24th, 2395_

_Village of Haedoji_

_Oak Hearth - The Shore Pack_

 

 

They trooped, successful hunters, past fields of barley stirring in the light breeze, goats grazing in the hills. One of the cows they kept for fattening and finishing lowed lazily. As they walked, Yoongi, a contented man, often thought of himself as blessed. He was lucky to be able to end one season and start the next together with people he loved.

Smoke puffed from chimneys as they walked down the cobbled street lined with sturdy stone and wood houses. As they approached, the pups- finished with a long days work- raced ahead of their elders. Yoongi’s Bearer, a thin, slight omega male, opened the door to let the juveniles scampered inside. Yoongi’s Sire, a short stocky alpha male, graying at the temples, stepped forward to greet his mate. He teasingly held out the clutch of birds but his mate, a studious person, who had long since reached his threshold when it came to farm work and homesteading, turned his nose up at cleaning game. Yoongi smiled as his sire kissed his mate with good humor on the mouth and started off around the side of the building to the shack where they stacked the firewood in the winter. Yoongi gave his bearer a gentle wave and followed the other alpha around the house. Inside, on a bench they’d built just for the purpose, the two tended to the birds; plucking feathers and setting them aside for cleaning later.

They talked as they worked, idle chatter of the hunt and the meal to come. Yoongi took out a pair of sharp shears and used them to cut the wings off a pheasant. He cleaned it as his Sire had taught him, cutting close to the body.

Once the birds were done, they rinsed them in icy water pumped straight from the well and then carried them into the house through the back door of the kitchen. The omegas and betas who hadn’t gone on the hunt, mostly pregnant Bearers or those with small children, were gathered in the big, warm kitchen, the air rich from the scent of baking and warmth from the fire cracklings in the hearth. Above the hearth, an intricate carving of an Oak leaf proclaimed to all who entered the home that this was the Oak Hearth, the hearth Yoongi's great-grandfather had established when he mated and decided to move out of his own father’s house.

It all struck Yoongi as distinctly 'home'. A never ending feeling of safety and love. It tugged at his heart. Yoongi's sire laid the cleaned birds in the counter and then turned to tug his mate into a bone crushing hug that made the quiet man laugh.

“The return of the hunters,” the omega said, the smirk in his voice making the words come out as more of a purr. He placed a quick kiss on the alpha’s cheek but a lull in the chatter in the room allowed the smack of his lips to be heard. There was a bit of good-natured cooing at the display of affection from the usually reserved omega towards his mate.

Yoongi’s aunt, a beta woman on his father’s side, stepped forward to survey the pile of birds on the table and nodded in approval, her mop of curly red hair that matched her russet fur in wolf form bounced as her head moved.

“This is enough to serve roast as our gift for feast tomorrow night and have leftovers for the next morning, too. I can make some meat pies, as well. You’re fond of them as I recall, Yoongi.”

He fixed his aunt with a beatific smile, and she beamed, rubbing a hand through his hair affectionately as she passed on her way to gather the birds, leaving a smear of her honeysuckle scent behind.

“‘Maybe I should go out and bag a few more, if your going to make meat pies. Yoongi will eat the whole tray himself.” Yoongi’s sire joked.

A titter of laughter greeted his words and Yoongi joined in. He stopped when an alpha cousin spoke up, her eyes glimmering in the half-light if the fire and her curtain of dark hair shone a beautiful chestnut as she pushed it over her shoulder. “He needs to find himself a good mate. Then they can make him all the meat pies he wants, then the rest of us won’t have to suffer at holidays.”

The smile slid of Yoongi’s face and her words were greeted by an awkward silence.

She looked around the room and sighed. “What? It’s been over a year.”

Her mother smacked her lightly on the back of the head. His cousin sighed and turned to Yoongi,

“I’m sorry, Yoongi-oppa.” Her smile was hollow and Yoongi knew she was only apologizing to appease her mother. He accepted it anyway.

“It’s fine.”

It should have been fine. He knew people expected him to have moved on by now. Kihyun hadn’t even been his True Mate. That didn’t change the fact that Yoongi had loved him, though. Falling in love outside of a true mating wasn’t uncommon. A lot of the time the wolves involved could make it work. Kihyun hadn’t wanted that. He’d met his True Mate and it was like the other alpha was all he could see. Like Yoongi no longer mattered.

Yoongi had skipped the Summer Meeting this year because he couldn’t stand to see them stand up before the whole community and pledge their bond to each other.

Yoongi was a bit older than most wolves were when they found their first mate. If he was an omega it probably wouldn’t have been tolerated, but since he was an alpha people let it slide. He could tell that they were beginning to get impatient with him, though.

His older brother, Junki, was a beta. He’d been mated for the last few years to a lovely beta girl but as was typical of betas, no children had been forthcoming.

People were impatient for Yoongi, as his father’s heir and the eventual leader of their Hearth, to mate and produce an heir of his own. Kihyun had been welcomed into his family with open arms and his choosing Hyunwoo over Yoongi had cut deep, but it seemed like everyone had healed from that particular insult before Yoongi had.

Yoongi’s bearer broke the silence by calling for him from the other room. “Yoongi-yah! Come help me get out the extra chairs!”

Yoongi bowed to his family before quickly exiting the room. He headed for a door to the left of the staircase that lead to the upper floor. The door was bigger, wider than any others in the house, and lead to a wide hallway beyond that smelled of sawdust and varnish. Down the hall, an open archway lead into a room with high, vaulted ceilings, filled with various benches and tables covered in tools and pieces of furniture in various states of completion. The Oak Hearth family workshop.

Members of the Oak Hearth were woodworkers, the best on the island. Yoongi was the best of the best. It wasn’t bragging, it was just the truth. He had a natural feel for the wood and he could picture completed pieces in his head just as clearly as if they were in front of him. He played wood the way most people played an instrument. He could make it sing any song he wanted. His commission list was so long it extended into next fall.

His Bearer stood on the far side of the room, removing a sheet from a set of chairs lined up along the back wall. Some of Yoongi’s work, they were beautifully carved out of the choicest pieces of maple. They matched the table and chairs in the dining room and it had taken him over six months to complete the entire set to his standards.

He walked over and placed and arm around his bearer’s waist, leaning against the older man for a moment, gaining comfort from the feel of him.

“What’s the matter, my baby?” The older man murmured, running long, steady fingered hands that matched Yoongi’s own through his youngest son’s hair. His cool, soothing aloe scent washed away the almost stifling honeysuckle scent his aunt had left behind.

“Nothing, _Beba_. I’m fine.”

“You’re a bad liar, sweetheart. Your scent is sour.”

“Alright, fine. Are you disappointed in me? Am I a bad son?”

The older man squeezed Yoongi’s face between his palms, making Yoongi’s lips fish out as he surveyed him, eyebrows serious. “You’ll do.” The older man said, smiling at him as Yoongi rolled his eyes.

“Seriously. Do you wish I was mated already?”

“The only thing I was for you is happiness. Are you happy, my love?”

“I’m not unhappy.”

“Then for now, I am content. If some day you are not not-unhappy, and you think that finding a mate will fix that, then that is what I want for you. Until then? This is fine.”

Yoongi leaned forward until his forehead pressed against his bearer’s.

“I love you.”

“You’re suppose to love me. I gave birth to you.”

Yoongi rolled his eyes again and moved to grab a couple of the extra chairs from the wall.

They had dinner together, the happy family. A large pot of braised goat and dumplings, topped with fresh green onions from the garden. Someone had brought a loaf of bread and it was served with butter Yoongi was sure had been churned just that morning. Several bottle of his bearer’s homemade wine were cracked open as well as a couple of bottles of soju.

A thin, light rain fell outside as they cleared the table and washed up.

Yoongi stood next to his sire, washing dishes. Their elbows knocked as they worked silently with a sense of camaraderie. His bearer cooked and they washed. It was just how it was.

“Did you know the River Pack was coming?” Yoongi asked. His father sighed, running a soapy hand through his hair.

“They arrived at the edge of our territory that same morning. They sent a runner in and asked for Shihyuk. Next thing I knew he was calling a pack council meeting and telling Yongguk he had to take the Park Omega on as a second mate. Of course, the boy refused. He’s got a mate at home caring for a pup who can barely count two moons. Dug his heels in pretty furiously, too. I was proud of the amount of backbone he showed. He’ll lead us well one day.”

Yoongi nodded. He had nothing but respect for Yongguk. He was smart, level-headed, strong. Everything an alpha should be.

“Have you spoken with Namjoon since the meeting?” His father asked.

Yoongi shook his head. “He’s been avoiding everyone. He goes out and does his patrols and then goes straight back home. He’s been having Soobin give us our orders, claims it’s good practice for him if he’s gonna be Scout Master some day. I heard that the River Pack is upset with him, they want him at the negotiations for the Park Omega’s bond price, but he’s refusing to show up.”

Yoongi’s sire frowned, “If he doesn’t want to take the boy on as a second mate then he shouldn’t.”

“Come on, you know how it is. I’m sure the Prime is holding something over him to get him to agree.” Yoongi glared at the cup in his hands as he scrubbed it. Namjoon was one of his oldest friends, they’d grown up as agemates and they’d joined the scouts together. Yoongi had been the first person Namjoon told when realized he was in love with Seokjin and Yoongi had been there when he decided to run away with the older omega. Yoongi had helped Namjoon build the cabin on the peninsula when no one else would, spending months building cabinets and designing furniture for the new couple. And when Kihyun had left him he’d taken up residence in their spare room until he was ready to face the rest of the pack again.

So maybe it hurt a bit that his friend was avoiding him now, but he also knew that he had to have at least a passable reason to do so.

“What if I offered to take the Park Omega on as my mate?” He said suddenly, placing the rinsed cup onto the drying rack and moving on to a platter. His father hummed quietly in response.

“And why would you do that?”

Yoongi shrugged. “They’re looking for an alliance, right? I have the status. We’re a First Family and I am the highest ranked unmated alpha in the pack. It would be a good match.”

“I’m sure it would be. I have the utmost confidence that you’d be a fine mate to anyone who’d have you. But Tal wishes for us to find our mates out of love, not out of obligation. I would have that for you, Yoongi.”

“That’s idealistic nonsense. Most matings these days are for status, not love.”

“Maybe second or third mates, but my son I truly believe most Taliians make an effort to find love for their first match…”

"Why did you never take a second mate?"

"Because your _beba_ was enough for me. I found everything I wanted in him, and no one else has caught my eye since."

“I thought I’d found that for myself, too…”

“So you want to give up on trying again?”

“I could learn to love him. I’d court him first, anyway, a promise ceremony isn’t binding.” A fact he knew all too well, “If it turned out we hated each other we could just call it off. And this way Namjoon won’t have to go along with whatever bullshit his father is planning…”

Yoongi’s father watched him rant with a quirked brow and Yoongi flushed, a bit ashamed by is outburst.

“If it what you think it best, I won’t stop you. We would welcome him to the Oak Hearth with open arms.”

Yoongi placed the platter on the drying rack and realized with a start that they’d completed the dishes. He sighed.

“It’s too late now, anyway, isn’t it? Their Promise Ceremony is tomorrow…”

“I’m sure if you really wanted me to I could speak with the Prime in the morning.”

Yoongi thought about it, thought about the tiny omega standing up there on the Speaking Rock next to the Prime and tried to picture spending the rest of his life with him. He couldn’t even really remember his face. He supposed that was the biggest sign so far that he was being ridiculous if he couldn’t even remember what the kid looked like.

“You’re right I’m being too hasty…”

They extinguished the lanterns in the kitchen, carrying one of them with them as they moved through the living room and up the stairs. Outside Yoongi’s room his sire patted him on the back.

“You’re a good person, Yoongi. I’m glad you’re trying to move on, but give yourself a real chance before you commit to anything so serious.”

Yoongi heard his bearer’s voice murmur in greeting as his sire closed the door and left Yoongi standing in the hall, feeling like the biggest coward on the island.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry we didn't make it back to Hanbin lol, I did warn that this fic would be epic fantasyesque- including all the frustrating epic fantasy style cliffhangers that take a chapter or two to get back to >.<
> 
> ———
> 
> Come see me on twitter: [@vinniekpop](https://twitter.com/vinniekpop)
> 
> CuriousCat: [@climbingvines](https://curiouscat.me/climbingvines1)


	5. I see a bad moon rising

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, it's 4am and I'm posting an update so please ignore any glaring typos I'll fix them when I actually understand what words are again. There's some kicky, stabby, punchy bits at the end so please look out for that. 
> 
> \- Vinnie

_October 17th, 2395_

_Village of Haedoji_

_The Shore Pack_

 

 

“A circle begins and ends in the same place.”

Namjoon stood in the Temple of the Moon. The sanctuary was pitch black, all the windows shuttered and covered with black cloth to block out even the slightest bit of outside light. The entire pack was crammed into the cavernous stone room, each of them holding a candle. The flames flickered like starlight all around he and Jimin where they stood in the middle of the room.

Sunmi, the Head Acolyte of Kyolhon, He Who Watches Over Mates and Guards Bonds As Well As Hearts, stood before them holding high the opal carving of the Moon, usually kept safe and sound in the tiny chapel where people went to pray to Tal herself. As she spoke, she turned the stone in her hands,

“Life is a circle that begins and ends like the cycles of the moon. The Great Moon Mother gave us the gift of new life and lead us here to Saeloun; Our New Beginning. She is our Beginning and our End. From Her we came and to Her we shall return. In all ways, She and Her Brood provide for us. We are Her Children as they were Her Children. They give freely Their abundance. From them we gain all things good. But it is only from Mother Tal and her Wisdom that we learned of our greatest gift, all-encompassing love. Tal takes joy in Her Children’s happiness. To Mate is a wondrous thing. In it, we honor Her and show reverence. To the Blessed among us, our dear Omegas, Tal has given them the miraculous power to create life. To the Favored among us, our versatile, boundless Betas, Tal has given them the ability to provide perfect balance. To the Gloried among us, our exalted Alphas, Tal has given them strength and dominance with the expectation that they use it to protect her Blessed, Her Favored, and any children who may come of a union between them. Mating means you take responsibility for someone, that you will provide for them, care for them, and that a child of your mate is your child, regardless of parentage. Regardless of your status, of your dynamic, or of your origin.”

Jimin stood facing him, almost a whole head shorter than him, the sparkling candle light seemed to live in the coppery tresses of his hair and twinkle in his big doe eyes and Namjoon’s stomach lurched when he thought about Sunmi’s words and what they meant. Could he be that for this omega? He didn’t think he could be. Jimin was beautiful, standing there before him draped in sparkling mosi, the fine ramie fabric was a pale blue to wrap him in the Moon and Her passive, yielding, and receptive nature.

Namjoon’s own robes were a deep red, so red they were almost black; meant to blend together the passion of the Sun and the steadfastness of the Night, as well as usher in a fresh start and auspicious beginnings. His mother had brought them to him that morning. She’d made them for him years ago but when he choose to mate with Seokjin and...well, he’d never gotten to wear them.

Jimin was beautiful, standing there, but Namjoon didn’t love him.

Sunmi turned to him and bowed once, deeply. She met his eyes and asked in a strong voice,

“Bang Namjoon, Born of the Village of Haedoji, Numbered Amongst the Alphas of the Shore Pack, Leader of the Butterfly Hearth, Third Born Son of the Saltwater Hearth. You have asked Jimin, Born of the Village of Kangbyon, Numbered Amongst the Omegas of River Pack, Fourth Son of the Whirlpool Hearth, to one day join with you. You have come here today, to make that Promise in front of our Pack, that one day you will take this Omega as your Mate. Is this true?”

“Yes, it is true.” Namjoon didn’t hesitate. His voice was solemn, his face serious, and his brows pinched but he spoke the words.

“Park Jimin, Born of the Village of Kangbyon, Numbered Amongst the Omegas of the River Pack, Fourth Son of the Whirlpool Hearth, do you accept this Alpha’s Promise?”

Jimin watched the tall alpha before him. This was the closest he’d been to the man since he’d greeted him so tersely before the entire village. He looked at him closely; at the down-turned corner of his mouth, at the way the candlelight played off his silvery hair and made the rich tone of his skin seem so warm and inviting. He was so handsome, so strong, so sad.

There was movement in the shadows just beyond the circle of starlight the Shore Pack created. If he hadn’t been watching Namjoon so closely, maybe it wouldn’t have caught his attention, but it did and Jimin’s found himself meeting the eyes of a man who stood just beyond the crowd.

There he was. Namjoon’s mate. The elusive Seokjin. He’d heard a lot about the man, but try as he might he’d never been able to pin him down. He’d wanted to at least meet him before the ceremony, but Seokjin seemed just as set on avoiding him as Namjoon had been. But there he was now; tall, with broad shoulders, dressed in loose, dark robes. A curtain of silky black hair falling over his forehead and barely obscured dark eyes that sparkles like polished obsidian in the flickering light. He was beautiful, imposing, terrifying, powerful. And sad. So so sad.

But Jimin wasn’t doing this for to make anyone happy, not even himself. He was doing it for his pack.

“Yes.” Jimin said, “I accept his Promise.”

Sunmi turned to Jinyoung, Jimin’s father and smiled. “Park Jinyoung, Head Alpha of the River Pack and of the Village of Kangbyon, Leader of the Whirlpool Hearth, Sire of the Omega Park Jimin, do you accept and approve of the fact that someday there will be a blood link between the Whirlpool Hearth and the Saltwater Hearth?”

Jinyoung’s eyes flickered to his son, his only omega child, cherished and protected his whole life, being used as a pawn to save his village; and was so proud of the boy’s bravery.

“Yes, I accept it.”

“Bang Shihyuk, Taliian Prime, Head Alpha of the Shore Pack and of the Village of Haedoji, Leader of the Saltwater Hearth, do you accept and approve of the fact that someday there will be a blood link between the Saltwater Hearth and the Whirlpool Hearth?”

Shihyuk was beaming. “Yes. I accept it and I welcome it.”

Maybe Jimin imagined it; the small, choked sound of hurt from beyond the circle of light, but he definitely didn’t imagine the flash of anger in Namjoon’s eyes at his father’s words.

Sunmi nodded,

“Then I shall name the Ties.” She stepped forward and touched the cool surface of the opal to his forehead. “Park Jimin, you are Blessed of Tal, given the gift to bring forth life. Honored of Kyolhon; Protector of Love and Unions. Scion of Uihak; Protector of Those Who Labor to Bring the Next Generation Into the World. Devoted of Misul; Source of Inspiration and Artistic Ability of All Who Wish to Create. Park Jimin, I shall name your Ties. Omega. Son of Park Jinyoung, Pack Alpha of the River Pack, Leader of the Village of Kangbyon, Devoted of Namu, Son of Lim Sangmi, Omega Second Mate of Park Jinyoung, Departed. Brother of the Hearth to Park Jinyoung the Younger, Pack Alpha Heir Apparent, Brother of the Blood to the Beta Park Jihyun.”

Jimin felt a bit sad that the rest of his siblings weren’t named during the ceremony, but he knew for the sake of briefness, only his most important Ties were named to show his status to the pack. His oldest brother would one day be the Head Alpha of the River Pack, so he was a given, and his youngest brother, Jihyun, was his only full sibling, born just a few short months before their mother passed away.

Sunmi turned to Namjoon and repeated the process, reaching high to touch to opal to his forehead she intoned,

“Bang Namjoon you are Gloried of Tal, an an earth-bound embodiment of Hae the First Alpha whom you should always strive to emulate; tasked with the Protection of the Pack as Scout Master. Honored of Kyolhon; Protector of Love and Unions. Devoted of Chugun; The First Beta and He Who Holds Knowledge in the Highest Regard. Kim Namjoon I shall name your Ties. Alpha. Scout Mastef. Mate of Kim Seokjin, Omega, He Who Speaks For The Moon, Devoted of Kongang and Uihak. Son of Bang Shihyuk, Taliian Prime, Head Alpha of the Shore Pack, Leader of the Village of Haedoji, Devoted of Mul. Son of Kim Yejin, Omega Second Mate of Bang Shihyuk, Devoted of Nanlo. Brother of the Hearth to Pack Alpha Heir Apparent Bang Yongguk, the Omega Yongnam, and the Beta Nara. Brother of the Blood to the Beta Kyungmin.

She placed the carved opal on a small stand directly in the center of the floor and directed them both to drop to their knees. Slowly, as they both bowed low to the floor she pulled on a long velvet rope, opening a skylight. A beam of moonlight shone through falling directly on the alpha and omega pair. They finished their bow, rising up together. Sunmi held a crystalline cup of rice wine first to Namjoon’s lips and then to Jimin’s.

“Namjoon, after your Mating, Jimin will join the Butterfly Hearth as your First Mate. From this day forward you are Staking a Claim. He shall be acknowledged as your intended First and shall be afforded all the respect and status that position entails. Do you agree?”

Namjoon had almost seemed to relax a bit as they went through the motions, especially when he heard Seokjin’s name, Jimin noticed, listed among his ties in a way it probably usually wasn’t judging by the rumors and gossip he’d heard swirling around the village since his arrival. The Prime, who stood behind Namjoon, hadn’t seemed to pleased to hear his son’s mate mentioned in the ceremony.

However, as soon as it was declared before the whole pack that Jimin was to take Seokjin’s place as Namjoon’s First Mate, the blonde alpha’s jaw had clenched, and when he opened his eyes, the look there was nothing short of murderous. The omega in Jimin wanted to cower, to postulate, to beg for forgiveness even though he’d done nothing wrong. There was a sharp scent in the air, something like burning herbs but it was too thick for him to make out what it really was. Almost at the same time, there was a bitter sour citrus scent and then suddenly there was a suddenly influx of night air, a breeze that swept around the room and made the flames sputter and flicker. The heavy wooden door to the sanctuary opened and then swung shut and Jimin could no longer see the shape of Seokjin in the shadows. He was gone.

Namjoon spoke.

“I agree.”

 

\-----☽✮☾-----

 

After the ceremony ended, a feast was served. Usually the meat provided at the Promise Feast hunted by the alpha or beta especially for the occasion. Jimin had seen Namjoon come into the village center that morning just after dawn and present a freshly killed deer to the Prime without a word. Under normal circumstances, he would have presented it to Jimin and there would have been much teasing from Jimin’s friends as they fussed over the quality of the deer and how strong his alpha was. Except Jimin was alone here in Haedoji with just his father and their entourage, he had no friends to fuss over him, and he had never actually spoken to Namjoon other than his failed attempt to speak to him the day their fathers proposed their union. Even during the ceremony they’d never spoken directly to each other, just to the acolyte.

He’d learned a lot since that first day in Haedoji.

He’d learned that there wasn’t going to be a fairy tale ending to this story. That despite Namjoon being young and handsome, he wasn’t going to be falling head over heels for Jimin any time soon.

Of course, he’d learned that Namjoon already had a mate. He’d learned that Namjoon had a reputation for being rebellious and more than a bit selfish. He learned that Namjoon lived with his mate out on the rocky outcrop of the peninsula instead of in the main village with the rest of the pack. He’d learned that up until just a few days ago, Namjoon’s father, the Prime, had disowned him.

He’d learned a lot.

At the feast, gifts were traditionally given to the intended and gifts are given by the intended in return. Jimin had spent the last month sewing and crafting and creating before they made the trek to Haedoji to have enough gifts to hand out. The amount and type of gifts showed status, after all. It became painfully obvious as the feast went on that Namjoon had no idea this was going to happen. There were no gifts from him, nothing that screamed ‘alpha’. No pelts, no weaponry, no carvings. There were things Namjoon’s mother and the Prime’s First Mate contributed in Namjoon’s name, of course. There were even a few sweet smelling herbal teas that Jimin suspected Namjoon’s acolyte mate, Seokjin, might have secreted into the pile, but nothing from Namjoon’s own hands.

The gift giving process was awkward and stilted, with Jimin scrambling to find an appropriate gift to give in return as each member of the Shore Pack filed past where he and Namjoon sat on a raised platform in the Great Hall. Everyone had eaten already and Jimin had been briefly concerned that they were going to run out of food. It was only due to the efforts of a smiling omega with a sleeping infant bound securely against his chest that they didn’t run out of food. Jimin had asked around and learned that the man’s name was Himchan, Namjoon’s half-brother’s mate and the future Head Omega. Watching the man work, he wondered what the day might have been like if Yongguk had agreed to take him on as a mate instead.

While normally a Promise Ceremony and the following Feast was just for close family and friends, it seemed like the entire village was there to witness the spectacle that was their impending union. He received more kitchen utensils and simple jewelry than he was ever going to use in his life and it became very apparent that most people had just grabbed something to pass off as a gift so they could get through the door. He started to become more discerning with which gifts he gave in return, saving the choice items for people who brought thoughtful gifts, but it made him nervous, afraid he would give too simple of a gift to a packmate off high status and cause offense, but Namjoon was no help, sitting with his head bowed and his hands tucked into the sleeves of his robes.

He looked across the room to where his father sat with his oldest brother and the River Pack council members. He wondered how long they’d stay before they made the trek back home. Would they be gone in the morning? Would he have a chance to say goodbye? He thought he might. Usually one could expect to sleep in the day after their Promise Ceremony, worn out from an evening of sex, but he had no expectations about what his night would hold. In fact, if Namjoon were to for some reason express interest in such extracurricular activities, he would be inclined to say no. They were virtually strangers, after all. Getting up early in the morning to see his father and brother off wouldn’t be a chore at all.

Traditionally, the Feast ends with the intended being lead to their new home to begin their trial period before Mating. Whether it be a new addition just for them on an already existing pack house, or a whole new pack house if they were looking to establish a hearth- they were expected to live together and get to know each other as living partners before making the final decision to become Mates. During the Feast, packmates would sneak in and fill the addition or the bedroom of a new pack house with anonymous gifts. Baby supplies, treats, food, frivolous things that expressed their wishes for their future and their desire for them to enjoy their future mating. But Namjoon lived with Seokjin who outside of the Temple was never acknowledged as his mate, and therefore the house he built for Seokjin was never acknowledged as a true packhouse by the council, and he refused to let them acknowledge it now for his impending mating with Jimin. Jimin knew this because shortly before the Feast started he’d had to pretend like he didn’t hear Namjoon and the Prime growling and snarling at each other out in the hallway.

In the end, Namjoon had agreed only because Jimin was sure Seokjin had intervened. There had been a third voice, if only for a moment, and then Namjoon had relented. They could put the gifts in the spare bedroom, but not the master suite. Jimin’s father had been furious, of course, and he’d wanted to call the whole thing off and take Jimin back to Kangbyon right then and there, but Jimin would have refused to go. He’d agreed to this. The Ceremony had already been completed. This union was what needed to be done for the future of their pack. And besides, he could sympathize with the young alpha. He, too, was in an unfamiliar and uncomfortable situation.

Jimin had been seconds away from stepping in himself and suggesting the gifts just be delivered to the Hunting Lodge where Jimin was staying with his father and the rest of their delegation. If he was being honest with himself, he hadn’t been able to get that small, choked sound Seokjin had made listening to his mate promise himself to someone else out of his head. He didn’t want to disrespect the other omega anymore than he already had by insisting that his new relationship with Namjoon be so prominently displayed in the home Seokjin shared with him.

The pack lined the street leading out of the village. Jimin followed Namjoon as the alpha lead the way. When they reached the edge of the village they trailed behind them for a ways but none of them seemed to keen on following them all the way out to the peninsula. Jimin could hear the waves breaking on the rocks and the sound of crickets chirping. The wind shifted and ruffled the white blonde of Namjoon’s hair as he walked. His scent drifted on the wind and Jimin was able to identify the mystery herb as basil, and there was a slight tinge of juniper there as well. Very earthy and green. It was a pleasant scent, Jimin was surprised to find, when Namjoon wasn’t stewing in a pot of his own emotions.

The house crested the horizon and Jimin couldn’t help but admire it. Rustic wood and stone with a large porch and a small cottage near the back of the lot. Well tended landscaping; flowers and shrubbery and a lovely garden. It was a beautiful house. A home. For some reason, that made him sad.

Namjoon opened the front door and held it open for Jimin. He bowed slightly as Jimin passed him. They stood in the foyer, tense. Namjoon slipped his shoes off and placed them on the rack. Jimin mimicked him.

They stared at each other some more.

“Let me…. I’ll show you to your room.” Namjoon grunted. He turned and began to climb the stairs, pausing for a moment to make sure Jimin was following him.

Jimin wasn’t following him. He stood at the bottom of the stairs with an eyebrow raised, his arms crossed over his chest, all that sparkling blue fabric billowing around him like a cloud. Like hell he was going to follow a strange alpha up a dark staircase in a house he’d never been in before.

Namjoon caught on rather quickly. “Seokjin is upstairs.”

Jimin regarded him skeptically, but he took a deep breath anyway. At first he couldn’t pick out the other omega’s scent because the whole house smelled like various tea blends, but eventually he was able to separate a green tea scent that seemed more… alive than the others. Warmed by something golden and sweet like honey. It was a fresh scent, a nearby scent.

Slowly, he followed Namjoon up the stairs.

“The bathroom in here…” the alpha said, gesturing to a door at the top of the landing. “The house is built on a natural gas deposit so we actually have a pretty decent supply of hot water. Don’t worry about conserving it too much. We have our own well...so just don’t worry I guess is what I’m trying to say. I know you grew up on Mid River where water isn’t such a big issue but I don’t want you to worry about it… we have plenty.”

The alpha was rambling but Jimin just let him talk. At least he was talking.

He pointed to the door just down the hall from the bathroom, “This is the guest room. Your room. They brought your things over earlier and all the… all the well-wishes are in there, but if you need anything else just let me know. Or let Jin know… he’d probably know better than I would…” he pointed to the door across the hall, “and this is our room- Jin and I’s room- we have our own bathroom so don’t worry about sharing with us. I usually leave pretty early in the morning and Jin is an early riser so if you like to get up late feel free to help yourself to anything in the kitchen. Well not anything because sometimes Jin has plans for the food and if you mess up his menu he might- well- he might get upset? So like within reason? Jin has his office in the cottage behind the house so you can always look for him there if you need to ask first? If he’s not there he’d be at the Temple of Healing… or at the Temple of the Moon… but if you were going to walk all the way into the village you might as well just eat at the Great Hall in the kitchens? They serve food there all the time- I mean there’s always an omega or two around down there and-”

“Good night, alpha.” Jimin said, interrupting Namjoon mid-sentence. He pushed past Namjoon and opened the door to the guest room, wanting nothing more than to get out of his robes and into something more comfortable.

He closed the door with a quiet thud and left Namjoon standing alone in the hall.

Namjoon sighed and ran his hands through his hair. It turned into more of a frustrated tug, and he pulled at the strands until it hurt, trying to burn off some of his anxious energy.

He turned and opened the door to his own room, stepping into the room light by only a single lantern.

And then there he was. His Jin.

With a heavy groan, he quickly stripped out of the ceremonial robes and left them in a crumpled pile on the floor. He climbed into the big bed next to his mate and buried his face in the older man’s chest.

Beautiful, strong, intelligent, and funny. Just as lovely as the day he met him. Powerful, proclaimed the tattoo on his exquisitely defined cheekbone. Once upon a time, before Namjoon had been in his presence for even ten minutes, he’d known they were meant to be together. That there was nothing more he wanted in his life than for Seokjin to be his. Namjoon needed him the be his for his world to feel okay.

“You’re growling.” Seokjin murmured, voice drowsy. “What are you thinking?”

“That I love you.” Namjoon said. “That I am grateful every day that you decided to let me keep you.”

Seokjin hummed and rolled over on top of him with an easy confidence. “Good.” He said, “Gratitude is good. Love is better.” He paused, his lips hovering just above Namjoon’s. “I love you, too.”

“Today was.... frustrating. Nothing about it felt right, not like with you. The day I met you.... I saw my whole future. It was scary, but I’d never wanted anything more.”

Seokjin quirked a smile at him. “Me, too.” He said, before his lips finally fell to meet Namjoon’s.

They made love. To Namjoon’s amusement Seokjin pulled Namjoon’s hand to cover his mouth, to muffle the noises the omega made. Jimin slept just a room away, or at least, Namjoon hoped he slept. He didn’t want Jimin to think this was their way of saying he wasn’t welcome on his very first night in their home, but he needed that connection with Seokjin right now. Craved his touch, and the reassurance it brought. He needed his mate. And he needed him in a way he just couldn’t ever see the little river wolf fulfilling. Not even just physically, but emotionally. Seokjin was his other half. They fit together like puzzle pieces and as far as Namjoon could see, the puzzle was complete. There were no blank spaces. No where that Jimin could fit neatly.

One day, once all of this was over, once the threat hanging over the River Pack dissipated, Namjoon would set Park Jimin free.

 

\-----☽✮☾-----

 

_October 17th, 2395_

_Wonju Compound_

 

 

They ran.

The man continued to laugh and they ran. Behind them Hanbin heard the sickening crack of bone as the man’s laughter turned to a snarling howl. He stumbled, his feet threatening to slip out from underneath him. The gun on his back thudded against his spine, digging a bruise into his flesh but he couldn’t bring himself to draw it, to swing it over his shoulder, round on the Rogue and pull the trigger. What if he missed? The man, the _wolf_ , would be on him in seconds.

Hanbin’s instincts growled at him, demanding that he stand and fight. He felt an almost compulsion to stop and stand his ground but he forced his feet forward, pounding feet eating up the ground as they sprinted between tree and vaulted over fences, moving as quickly as they could away from the farmland at the edge of the wall, back towards the Compound proper where the main bulk of the village stood.

A part of him screamed that he was leading the creature right to them, but he also knew that he didn’t stand a chance against the Rogue on his own. Maybe if he could convince Cheoljun to cover him one of them might be able to get a shot off of the beast, but they wouldn’t both survive the maneuver. With the village at their back, the Rogue would be outnumbered.

At least that’s what he thought until he heard the gun fire. Terror ripped up his spine as he shoved the last bit of strength into his legs and burst through a row of hedges to stumble onto one of the narrow Compound streets, Cheoljun hot on his heels. They sprinted up a narrow alley between a block of shops and an small apartment building, as they reached the end of the alley a woman ran in front of them, dressed only in her night clothes. It took him barely a second to recognize her as the omega girl who worked the counter at the tailors, and he called out to her,

“Kyungshim!”

She stopped, whirling towards the sound of his voice.

“Alpha!” she sobbed, stumbling towards him.

Calling out to her had probably saved her life. Just as she turned her body, the body of a massive wolf slammed into her, the jaws that had been aimed for her throat clamping down on her shoulder instead. She screamed, the sound reverberating around Hanbin’s skull and before he even really thought about what he was doing he’s ripped the gun from his back, took aim, and fired.

There was a yelp and then the creature fell limp. He lowered his gun as Cheoljun ran forward, shoving the mass of fur off of her, lifting her into his arms.

“What’s happened, Kyungshim? Where are your parents?” Hanbin asked, hurrying to Cheoljun’s side. The omega looked close to passing out, but he needed her to answer.

“...attacked the village... _Isa_ told me to stay put, she and mother…..wanted to help….” Her eyes rolled back and her head flopped to the side as she lost consciousness.

“Take her to Doc,” Hanbin said, “I have to go find out what’s happening.” There was a sound like claws scraping over stone from back the way they came and Hanbin glanced over his shoulder, fearing the Rogue they’d left behind had finally caught up to them.

“Go!” He whispered furiously, shoving the beta away from him towards the alley across the street. Hanbin took off at a run down the middle of the street, hoping to draw anything they might be in the area towards him and away from Cheoljun and Kyungshim.

His boots echoed off the buildings as he ran towards the sounds of fighting closer to the front of the village. He skidded around a corner and ran down a residential street. Curtains fluttered at packmates peered out darkened windows to see who was running by, hiding again quickly in fear of being seen. A shot rang through the air and Hanbin adjusted his path to follow the echo. He came across a packmate, an alpha woman, who was holding a small handgun. The Rogue in front of her writhed on the grown, shifting back to it’s human form.

“Bitch!” It spat from where it panted on the ground. She shrugged as she lifted a heavily booted foot and slammed it into the side of his face. The man fell to the ground unconscious. Hanbin skidded to a halt next to her.

“You alright?” He gasped. She nodded, pulling her belt free from the loops of her pants she pulled the man’s arms behind him tight and crossed them over themselves in the way they’d all be instructed to subdue one who profaned themselves by shifting into their bestial form. The binding would prevent them from being able to shift and break free of their bonds without the change ripping their own arms from the sockets, effectively rendering them defenseless.

Hanbin helped her drag him towards a nearby storefront. He kicked in the door, promising himself he’d pay the owners back in labor himself as they dragged the man inside and stuffed him in a storage closet in the back room of the small tea shop. He shoved a chair underneath the door handle and then piled a bunch of heavy boxes and crates on top of and around the chair as well.

Leaving the shop behind, he lead the way as the two of them made their way towards the village gates. Fires burned here and there, casting a sickly, flickering glow between the buildings and deepening the shadows. They slowed, creeping from corner to corner, listening for any sign that one of the attackers might be nearby. Hanbin hadn’t heard a gunshot in a moment; he was unsure if that was good thing or a bad thing.  

They passed an open doorway and Hanbin hesitated for just a moment before ducking inside the home. Moving as carefully as he could through the dark interior he held his gun ready to fire at the slightest sign on attack. The alpha woman stood watch at the doorway behind him.

The house was eerily quiet and he wondered what had happened to the family who lived there. He moved down a hallway and took deep breath, trying to scent if anyone was in the home or not. His picked up on three warm, living scents, but he also got a noseful of something sharp, acrid, and foreign. Something chemical. At the end of the hall he slowly reached for a knob that looked like it lead to a bedroom. He cracked the door, peering inside and was surprised to see a man and a woman sleeping soundly in their bed. Startled, he closed the door quickly and moved to open the door across the hall. A young man slept there, an alpha judging by the scent that wafted free. Puzzled, Hanbin opened the third door and was met with the smell of an omega female and an empty bed.

His heart jerked in his chest. Quickly, he left the hall and went back into the parents’ room. He moved to the male who slept closest to the door and called out to him.

“Sir.” He whispered firmly. There was no response. He moved closer and tried again, “ _Sir_. This is Yang Hanbin. I need you to wake up.”

Again there was no response. Hanbin grabbed the man by his shoulder and shook him. His head flopped to the side and he didn’t make any of the typical noises one would make as they were unexpectedly roused from sleep. Not a single groan or grunt.

Confused, Hanbin turned to the woman. “Ma’am! I need to know, was your daughter sleeping here tonight? It’s urgent!”

“They won’t wake up…” Hanbin jerked at the unexpected sound of the alpha woman’s voice coming from the bedroom door behind him. “I was out visiting a friend and I came home to my family…. They wouldn’t wake up either, and my daughter is gone.”

Hanbin shoved a hand through his hair as he stared down at the pair. It appeared that there was nothing wrong with them, they just simply… slept. He could see them breathing, there color was good and their skin was warm…

“What is your name?” He asked the alpha woman as he passed her, closing the door to the bedroom behind him.

“Chaerin. You would think as our future head alpha you would know all of our names by now.” She gave him a wry smile and he grimaced back. He actually tried to avoid learning his packmates names. It hurt less when he saw them die.

“Chaerin… and your mate is?”

“Sandara, a beta. They seem to be targeting only the very young… whoever they are. My daughter, Nari, is only eight, but they left my packmate Bom who is a fully grown omega behind in her bed, as well as my beta packmate Minji.”

“They took your daughter from her bed?”

She nodded, teeth bared in a snarl, “I was tracking them when I was attacked by that lowlife piece of shit we locked away in that closet. They were heading back towards the main gate.”

“The main gate…” Hanbin repeated.

Together they left the house, locking and closing the front door behind them. They made their way towards the front of the village, checking houses with open doors as they went for casualties, but all they found were sleeping alphas and betas and fully matured omegas and the empty beds where young omegas should have been resting.

Slowly, they cleared the residential area and approached the big central area in front of the main Compound gate where they loaded up the truck the Walls sent with the lumber they’d ordered.

Chaerin jerked her head to the side, indicating that she was going down the opposite street, circling around to the other side of the loading zone. He could see people moving around up ahead, but he couldn’t be sure if they were friend or foe just yet.

One of them passed under a street light and he barely restrained the growl that leapt into his throat. Clothed in mismatched rags, filthy hair matted, the man was obviously one of the attackers, which meant the people moving around in the shadows could only be his comrades. Hanbin dropped down into a crouch, moving along the perimeter of the loading zone with an ease of familiarity. As he moved, he caught sight of a group of what appeared to be hostages. Most of them wore only simple robes and night clothes, indicating that they must have been dragged from their beds as they slept, Hanbin noticed right away that they appeared to be the missing omegas. He could hear them sniffling and sobbing from his hiding place behind a stack of logs waiting to be stripped and cut in the saw mill that darkened the horizon in the distance.

“What went wrong?” He heard a voice snap.

“This is the largest Compound we’ve hit so far, sir. Too many variables. We should have picked a specific area of the village and stuck to it, sent in a smaller number of Pickers. Not everyone was asleep, we had to abandon a few of the marks and word got out. The Compound is rallying their forces. We sent some people around the backside to cause a distraction near the agricultural district, but they could be on us at any second.” A second voice responded.

“I knew this was a bad idea. Too close to the Walls, too old of a Compound. They’re too organized. Should have stuck to the Colonies…” said the first voice.

“Colonies never have the young ones. Those bitches are old, bitter, and sick. You know Master Kim needs better stock or else people are going to stop buying from him soon. Then who will pay for your soju…” said a third voice. There was a snarl and then a yelp.

“Shut up and help me get these brats into the van. We need to get moving. Tell the Scent Scrubbers to starts scouring, we can’t risk them following us- at least not very far. Once we hit the switchbacks we’ll be able to lose anyone they send after us.”

Hanbin watched as they loaded the omegas into a waiting van, the vehicle was sleek and new, the engine so quiet he could barely hear it hum. If they left in that thing they’d never be able to catch them. The compound had one working vehicle that wasn’t clunky farm equipment or giant slow moving trucks meant for hauling whole trees.

He saw them grab one of the oldest omegas, an age-mate of his he realized, a girl named Hayi, and shove a sobbing toddler into her arms. She shushed the pup, stepping into the back of the van with a glare that earned her a shove. The doors were shut behind her with a thump and he watched as two of the kidnappers- _slavers_ Hanbin realized, hopped into the cab of the van. One of them whistled sharply out the window and from the surrounding streets six or so more figures emerged. They surrounded the van, waiting to run after it on four legs. The engine revved and he realized if he didn’t do something now he’d lose his only chance. He didn’t know how long it would be before anyone else arrived and while he knew he didn’t stand a chance against so many men- so many _wolves_ \- by himself, he had to try.

Carefully, he laid the muzzle of his rifle over the top of the logs and took aim.

He squeezed the trigger. The rapport of his rifle rang throughout the loading zone and instantly all eyes were turned his direction, but it didn’t matter. His shot was true. One of the tires popped, followed quickly by another as he held his breath and fired again.

The Rogues turned in his direction, ready to drag him out of hiding when there was a feral scream and Chaerin came bursting out of the shadows with a shovel in hand. She hauled back and slammed it into the side of a furry head, sending the beast tumbling across the ground in a spray of blood and gravel. She planted a booted foot into the side of another wolf and sent it careening into one of it’s companions before she brought the spade of the shovel down into the neck of the first wolf. Driven by alpha strength and the all consuming instinct to protect her offspring, the shovel sliced through the beasts neck and it fell still.

With an angry snarl one of the wolves launched itself at her and Hanbin pulled the trigger a third time, taking the animal out before it could reach her. He went to turn his gun towards the front of the van, intent on picking off the driver when he felt like a bucket of ice water had been dumped over his head. He saw clearly in his mind’s eye Chaerin raising her shovel to continue her attack, but a dark shape jumped her from behind, it’s fangs ripping into her throat. She was dead before she hit the ground.

Frantic, he whipped the barrel of his gun back towards her and managed to squeeze off the shot just in time to hit the attacking wolf directly in the chest. The weight of the beast still slammed into her, knocking her off her feet, but she was able to roll out from under it and kicking and punching as the remaining wolves tried to take advantage of her fall.

Hanbin pushed down his shock at actually having thwarted one of his visions, vaulting over the stack of logs and sprinting towards where Chaerin was barely holding the attackers at bay. He swung his gun in an ark, slamming the butt against a skull with a satisfying crack. He heard the sound of shouts and raised voices and knew that help was on the way. He didn’t fire the gun again at such a close range so instead he wielded it like club, standing back to back with Chaerin and her shovel, swinging it at the circling wolves any time they tried to get close. A set of jaws snapped at his calf and he kicked out, landing a heel against a snout only to have another set of jaws clamp down onto his pant leg, jerking and twisting until he lost his footing, falling to his knees. He dropped the gun, scrambling for his knife on his hip he freed it just in time to make a desperate stab. The knife bit into flesh and he jerked it to the side until the blade came free. A set of jaws locked around his newly healed wrist, the brace saving him from fangs and teeth. He swung his arm away, but it was like for each snap of teeth he avoided there was another bite he couldn’t escape, another set of claws he couldn’t deflect. He heard Chaerin scream as she went down, but it wasn’t a scream of fear- it was pure frustration and rage.

The next thing he knew the snarls and yip surrounding him almost seemed to double and through a gap in the writing bodies he saw a blonde wolf, larger than the other wolves by at least half, tearing into the attackers. The wolf drove one of the slavers to the ground, teeth tearing into a soft vulnerable throat without hesitation, turning to swipe deadly claws across a muzzle, blinding her opponent as he lost an eye.

Her. Her opponent. Hanbin’s brain finally caught up to what he seemed to have known instinctively- the blonde wolf was _Chaerin_. The startled slavers turned all their attention to her allowing Hanbin to gain his feet, bleeding from innumerable wounds. He fired his gun into the air, trying to get the animals to scatter but they didn’t even seem to hear it, so focused were they on taking down the alpha wolf that had suddenly appeared in their midst.

Throwing the gun over his shoulder, he prepared to dive back in with just his knife when suddenly Hyunsuk burst into the loading zone, armed guards at his heels. The knot of wolves peeled away from Chaerin and took off for the gates. A few of the guards gave chase, following them towards the gates but they were too quick, disappearing into the night.

All that left were the two in the van. Hanbin strode to the door of the cab and wrenched it open. One of the men screamed as he grabbed them by the collar, pulling him from the van, but the other scrambled over the back of the seats and disappeared into the holding area in the back of the van.

Hanbin shoved the first man towards the waiting guards. He turned to go open the back of the van and remove the coward hiding among the omegas, but just as he reached for the latch he froze.

It was quick, just a flash but he saw it clear as day. Hayi held in the man’s arms and when he opened the door a flash of claws and blood.

He took a deep breath and pulled.

As soon as the door was open he threw himself inside, hoping there was no one between him and the man. He slammed into him, their figures rolling across the floor of the van as Hayi cried out and Hanbin hoped he hadn’t been too late.

He slammed his fist into the man’s face and then again and again until he stopped moving.

Hayi reached out with trembling hands and grabbed his face,

“Alpha, stop… He’s dead…” She whimpered. He collapsed, only then becoming aware of how his hands had become claws and his mouth felt too full. A quick lick of his lips was met with fangs and he gasped. He looked down at his hands, bloody and bruised and then at his shirt covered in flecks of blood and gore.

Someone had already begun to remove the children from the van, leaving just Hayi and himself behind with the dead man. Hayi wrapped her arms around him and scented him, rubbing her nose along his jaw in effort to calm him, not caring at all that she was smearing blood and viscera all over her own face.

He noticed then that she was crying and his instincts kicked in. He gathered her up into his arms and crawled from the van.

Outside, the clouds had shifted and the moon shone over the clearing, illuminating the bodies of the dead men some of whom had shifted in their last moments of life to their human forms.

A trio of guards was attempting to restrain the massive shape of Chaerin with rope as the blonde wolf struggled against them, trying to get at the group of omega children being looked over by Doc Kwon.

“Let her go!” He frowned and the guards looked between him and Chaerin anxiously, “ _Now_.” He said, lacing his words with a Command. The betas dropped their head and released the ropes. In a flash she had regained her human form and had scrambled across the ground, naked, to gather her daughter into her arms. Tears streamed down her cheeks as she checked the girl over for injuries herself.

He murmured a few more soothing words to Hayi before handing her off to Doc Kwon. His head felt fuzzy and his hands ached, his knuckles bruised and cracked, but he needed to find Hyunsuk.

He saw him there by the gates and started to make his way towards him. He walked a few meters on shaking feet, his knees threatened to give out every few steps. He could hear Hyunsuk talking. They were inspecting the gate, trying to figure out how they got in. The guards in the gatehouse were unconscious, unable to be roused just like the people they’d found sleeping in their beds. “....must be some kind of gas.” He heard someone say. Hyunsuk took a few steps beyond the open gate, peering down the road in the direction the wolves had disappeared.

Hanbin’s head was swimming, he struggled to put one foot in front of the other and then he was on the ground. He must have collapsed. He lay there for a moment, trying to will himself to get up but it was like his legs wouldn’t cooperate.

He saw her then, her crouched form dashing between the trees and undergrowth at the speed of light. The Rabid woman. It was like she was a spirit, the way she flew through the air to land on Hyunsuk’s back inhuman as she twisted in the air. Her teeth sank into the side of his neck and a quick slash of her claws split his side and then she was gone, her manic laughter echoing off the trees, seeming to chase her as she disappeared into the woods.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Come see me on twitter: [@vinniekpop](https://twitter.com/vinniekpop)
> 
> CuriousCat: [@climbingvines](https://curiouscat.me/climbingvines1)


	6. the killing moon will come too soon

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the long wait. Obviously all the shit that went down with Hanbin was... upsetting. But I love him and I have been working on this fic for a very long time and I don't want to give up on it now. So I'm going to continue this at my own pace and hopefully things will work themselves out. 
> 
> In this chapter, we're meeting Jungkook and his intro involves a flashback to when he was fourteen, but please know that in the majority of this fic he's an adult. There is some blood and gore in this chapter, a battle scene and references to slavery. Some no consensual touching takes place so if you want to skip it just skip over from the 'goats bleated' part down a few paragraphs, but I promise it's just like a couple of sentences and someone puts a stop to it right away. 
> 
> I would also like to warn that this chapter marks the beginning of the ‘Kpop idols in the role of villains’ tag so pls just know that I adore pretty much every idol and I’ve selected the villains based off of 1) each major culture on the islands is meant to emulate and Kpop company irl to an extent and 2) visuals. I picked idols who matched what I saw in my head based on looks and like physical traits. 
> 
> Other than that please enjoy this absolute monster of a chapter. If I could have cut it down, I would have. 
> 
> \- Vinnie

_October 6th, 2395_

_The City of Seoul; The Walls_

_19th Southern District; Gwanak-gu_

 

“Come with us to campus today.” Miyoung said, patting Taehyung’s shoulder sympathetically. “We’ll take you on a tour. Show you the arts building. Wouldn’t you like to paint?”

Taehyung burrowed deeper into his cocoon of blankets. He hadn’t left his room in three days. He knew his cousins knew, they must have heard through the thin walls just the same as he did. Miyeon had been sneaking him portions of her dinner and that made him feel even worse because there wasn’t enough to go around as it was, but his uncle had declared that Taehyung wouldn’t be eating until he decided to ‘behave like a responsible adult and talk to them’. 

“Don’t know what the point would be…” Taehyung mumbled. “M’gonna be mated off and knocked up within the year. You think Mr. Park is going to let me go to school?”

“He might… for something like accounting or business.”

“You mean in five to ten years when the pups are all in school and I can be my own person?”

“Taehyung-ah, you’re being ridiculous. You don’t have to mate _anyone_. No one can make you do anything!” Miyoung stomped her foot and Taehyung couldn’t help the small grin that tugged at his lips. “Come with us to campus. We’ll introduce you to our friends and I’ll show you that cute omega Miyeon’s been crushing on all semester.”

“Is he compatible?” Taehyung asked, curious. Omega-Omega pairings were rare, but if he was the right genotype they might get their MATCH approved. 

Miyoung snorted. “Who knows? Neither of us are interested in settling down just yet. He’s sure nice to look at though. Omega boys are just so much _prettier_.” She sighed dreamily.

Taehyung laughed a bit, feeling his despondent mood lifting bit by bit the more he listened to her talk. “Are you saying I’m not pretty?” He asked turning his head to flutter his lashes at her. 

“Oh, Taehyungie. You’re the prettiest.”

 

\-----☽✮☾-----

 

_October 6th, 2395_

_The City of Seoul; The Walls_

_2nd Western District; Mapo-gu_

 

 

The campus was... huge to say the least. There were many smaller educational centers inside the Walls to choose from, but the University was considered to be the best of the best. Located on the boarder between the 2nd and the 7th Districts, the credits required for one semester of classes alone were… astronomical. There was no degree system like in eras of the past, instead people took classes in any subject they desired, accumulating ‘prestige' in certain topics. For example, the twins had so far amassed enough prestige in subjects such as clothing design, sewing, and the like to earn them Level Three prestige in the textile industry. They were qualified to apply for jobs Level Three and below. There was also the availability of more practical classes like cooking, welding, computer programming, animal husbandry, construction, and the like that a person could take to help them learn skills to level up inside their industry. There were also classes that were geared more towards omegas, such as painting, music, dance, photography, flower arranging; anything that might be considered a special skill that would highlight an omega’s natural grace and beauty, as well as serve as a way of demonstrating their intelligence by showing their competence when it came to learning a skill that required hours of practice and dedication. 

His cousins had gotten into University on scholarships they’d earned from sending in a painstakingly arranged portfolio of their day wear. It might seem frivolous, but fashion was something that was actually encouraged inside the Walls. Citizens had so much of their lives decided for them that the Committee felt that the desire to express one’s self through clothing was understandable and should be looked upon favorably as a way to keep up the spirits of the general public. 

Even with their scholarships, his aunt and uncle still struggled to buy the girls their supplies and provide them with the credits they needed to commute to and from campus each day. Taehyung struggled to understand how exactly his aunt and uncle thought they were going to send him to school, too, but now that he knew how much money Mr. Park was offering them he thought he had it figured out. Maybe Mr. Park had given them money to educate him while they tried to convince him to mate the old alpha. 

Today, the twins had a vocal class. They went and sat in a small room with a young beta who had a very sly, but charming face as he ran them through a few vocal exercises and then lead them in signing a beautiful duet as he played along on a guitar. Taehyung sat outside the room and listened as their voices twined together sweetly. The building they were in was old, the sign by the door when they walked in had said it was almost entirely Pre-Desolation, and one of the first buildings that had been restored in the days when the Walls were being constructed. It was close to the Han River and had originally been used as temporary housing because of all the abundance of empty room that required minimal clean-up, unlike a lot of the residential areas. When the city began to look to the future and reopen the University for public education, it had originally served as the only building that held classes, and then over the years as more buildings were rehabilitated and opened it had become a sort of a catch all building for less permanent classes. 

The twins’ teacher was actually a perfect example of the transient nature of the classes that took place in the building. For starters it was his first semester teaching and as far as Taehyung could tell he had absolutely no teaching experience. Secondly, he was absolutely Taliian. Like there was no doubt at _all_ that he was Taliian. The inside of his left arm was a complicated flow of tattoos disappearing beyond the shirt sleeves rolled at his elbows. The hand strumming the strings of his guitar had yet another unfamiliar symbol etched across the back of it that shifted and moved with the play of tendons underneath his skin. Most surprising was the small tattoo of a feather on his temple just above his left brow. He’d never seen a person with a tattoo on their face before and at first he hadn’t been able to stop staring at it. 

When the lesson ended the girls came out with the man, giggling the whole way. 

“Oppa, do you want to go get lunch with us?” They asked him, standing shoulder to shoulder using some weird form of twin intimidation to get him to agree. The man laughed, hefting his guitar case over his shoulder. 

“Sure, who’s buying?”

“You’re the oldest, so of course it’s you.” Miyeon laughed. 

“Aish, you invite me and then make me pay?” He chuckled, already leading the way to the stairwell. The twins laughed skipping ahead shouting something about a race. Taehyung rolled his eyes. They were his noonas, a full year older than him, but sometimes he thought they had more in common with his younger siblings. The teacher shook his head, obviously fond. He and Taehyung walked together to the door, the teacher held it open for Taehyung and he inclined his head in thanks as they started down the stairs together. The girls were already several flights down. He could hear their laughter echoing up the stairs, the sounds of their kitten heels clacking on the tile as they stumbled down the steps.

“I’m Bogum.” The teacher said. He flashed Taehyung a self-assured smile and Taehyung couldn’t help but smile back. 

“Taehyung.”

“I know. The girls talk about you so much, I would have recognized you anywhere I think.”

Out on the street, the girls lead them across campus to the cafeteria where they loaded up on whatever rice dish they were serving (Bogum graciously paying for them all, including Taehyung’s despite his protests) and they settled in for a quick lunch. 

At one point Woosung, the pretty omega boy Miyeon had been crushing on came in and both twins took turns batting their lashes at him until the poor boy was as red as the sweater he was wearing. He left and they both giggled over him, Bogum shaking his head all the while.

“I will never understand you Mainlanders. You put so much stock in this MATCH program but then you still flirt just the same. Why not just ignore each other and wait for your ‘perfect match’ to show up in your mailbox? Why waste your time on someone who you might have to leave later?”

“Oh, we’re not wasting our time. We have no plans to mate any time soon. I just couldn’t…” Miyeon stops, looking at her sister aghast.

“We couldn’t even imagine being apart.” Miyoung frowned. “Not now anyway. No relationship we have is serious because the minute we settle down we’ll be separated and we…”

“We honestly can’t bear the thought.” Miyeon finished.

Bogum nodded. “I understand. On the Islands you wouldn’t have to be separated. People understand that twins are special to each other, two halves the moon chose to make whole. Courting twins is very serious, you might as well assume you’re going to end up as close as Co-Mates with your mate’s sibling’s mate. The relationship between the two suitors is very important, they have to like each other. They can’t be jealous or fight among themselves. You’d probably live at the same Hearth together and raise your children together.”

The twins stared at him with stars in their eyes but Taehyung frowned.

“Why are you telling them this?” he asked, suspicious. “Trying to talk them into leaving the Walls with you?” 

Bogum laughed, “Absolutely not.” He pointed to the feather tattooed on his temple. “I’m sort of a… historian among my people. I’m a Storyteller, but my role is so much more important than that. We keep the Taliians connected to the outside world. We bring them news about new advances in medicine and technology. We let them know which areas on the Mainland are safe to travel in, which areas are experiencing hardship. We carry messages and prototypes. Blueprints and schematics. But we also dedicate ourselves to spreading the word of Tal and her people to those who live beyond the shores of the Islands. Both so that people might understand them better and so that anyone who might be looking for it can find Tal’s light. I’m an observer. I give information where it might be needed, that’s all.”

“So if they wanted to go to the Islands you’d take them?” Taehyung asked, “If they wanted to, how did you put it? ‘Find Tal’s Light’? You’d help them with that?”

“Well I’d certainly point them in the right direction.” Bogum said with another sunny smile. “Right now, I’m just as trapped behind these walls as you are. I can’t leave until the spring, just like the rest of my people.”

“It’s dangerous in the winter outside the Walls.” Taehyung said, “If they let you leave you’d die.”

“Would we?” Bogum gave him a wry little smile before he stood from the table and hoisted his guitar back onto his shoulder. “Well, I have to go meet my next student. It was nice meeting you, Taehyung. I’ll see you ladies next week!”

 

\-----☽✮☾-----

 

_October 13th, 2395_

_Village of Kangbyon_

_The River Pack_

 

 

On the island where he’d been born, Park Jimin learned how to plant and grow and harvest, to respect and use the land. He learned how to move through fields and forests, silent as a shadow, to hunt and fish. To respect the life of animals; take no more than needed and to take none at all for sport. He learned to prepare food grown or taken from the land in his family’s kitchen or over a public fire. He learned food meant more than eggs fresh from the henhouse or a well-grilled trout. Food meant survival. 

He learned to sew, and though he disliked the time spent sitting plying a needle, he fell in love with the ability to create. He learned how to spin, creating spools of thread and yarn and he learned to weave; learned to love spending hours hunched over a loom, creating beautiful, unique bolts of material until his fingers were sore and bled. Clothes, he learned, weren’t simply something to wear. They protected the body, like a weapon. He respected weapons, and had learned from a young age how to string a bow, sharpen a knife, and in the most extreme of circumstances shoot a gun. He learned to use the weapons the Moon gave him by birth, how to bite and claw and tear. How to use his weight and size to his advantage. 

He learned how to build, with hammer and saw, to keep the fences in repair, to make repairs on the old packhouse he loved as much as the woods and the river. A strong fence, a sound wall, a roof that held back the rain offered more than a happy home. They, too, meant survival.

He learned, though he often simply knew, that those who were Touched possessed something that was more than a gift to be treasured, a craft to be honed, a weapon to be used with great care. They were, and would always be, essential to their people’s survival. And even then; even with food, with shelter, with clothing and weapons, even with the Touched, not everyone survived.

There had been war in the world Pre-Desolation, and bigotry and cruelty, just as there was now. He knew of the wars of the past from the books that had survived, from the stories passed on by word of mouth. And he knew of the wars that were still raging on the mainland from visitors who stopped in Kangbyon. His father had been a warrior once, before he took up the title of Head Alpha from his grandfather. He had taught Jimin to fight—with his hands, his feet, his claws and his teeth and his mind. He learned how to read maps and how to make them, and had once imagined following them one day on journeys far beyond the shores of the island he called home.

He had no attachment to the world that had existed before the Desolation that had killed so many. Billions, it was said. Many still told stories of when those great cities fell to the burning. When Youngjae caught glimpses of tomorrows, he told Jimin there would be more burning, more blood, more death. 

So Jimin learned. He learned about goodness from his _beba_ , generosity from his mother. He learned about love and light and respect from the home and family that life given to him. He learned of war and hardship and grief from the Storytellers who came to the village, traveling from the mainland or from islands nearby.

Even though Jimin wanted peace, wanted to build, to grow, he understood the need, the duty to fight to protect and defend. More than once he’d seen his father and siblings arm themselves and leave the village to help protect a neighbor, to help defend the next island over, to go to the mainland and rescue someone who couldn’t rescue themselves... More than once he’d seen their eyes when they’d come home again, and had known there had been blood, there had been death.

He’d been raised to fight, to defend, just like his alpha siblings. As the only omega, the expectations people had for him were different, and his father tended to shelter him, but even then, Jimin still learned. As the village basked in summer, as the crops ripened and fruit hung heavy, as the woods ran thick with game, bitter battles raged beyond the forests and fields, beyond the hills and mountains, beyond the shores of home.

He helped cut hay and barley, harvest fruit and vegetables. Daily chores helped keep him steady. He didn’t complain about the kitchen work. The end of summer and the coming of fall meant hours of pickling and canning that fruit and vegetables for the winter to come.

So it was a bit of a shock when he father had taken him aside on the day of his twentieth birthday and told him he was taking him away to meet his future mate. Not far, he’d been promised. One village over, where he would spend the cold season getting to know the alpha and come spring, if he thought it was a good match, they’d be mated. 

Jimin wasn’t stupid. He’d heard the rumors. Ever since last Summer Meeting when he’d had his Coming of Age Ceremony with all his agemates and the delegation from Sangil had arrived in their camp not even a day later. When they’d informed his father that their new Head Alpha was making a claim; he wanted Jimin as his First and he was willing to pay an exuberant Bond Price for him. Jimin wasn’t stupid, but he was sheltered. Even sheltered, he knew there was something wrong up on the mountain top. The last time anyone had seen an omega come down the mountain for the Summer Meeting was eight years ago, and even before then they’d kept to themselves, never leaving the Sangilion camp. There was something wrong, evil, _rancid_ and _terrible_ happening on that mountain top. He’d brought tea for his father and his advisors, listened to them talk about how they should do something, they should act, they should help, but Kangbyon was small, smaller than Haedoji, too isolated from the part of the island where the other two villages existed, Sangil could move on them, attack without any time for Kangbyon to ask Haedoji for aid.

His father and his advisors sat around talking about the problem on the mountain, and how they should solve it, but when faced with that problem head on? They gave the River Pack one year to prepare Jimin, to say goodbye to his family and friends, to decide what he would take with him and what he would leave behind. And his father hadn’t said no. 

Not in so many words, anyway.

When the Summer Meeting rolled around again, the Mountain Pack had come to collect him; Bond Price in tow. Carts full of furs and provisions, of trinkets and other odds and ends. His father had stood before them and said he was sorry, but Jimin had rejected the Claim. You see, Jimin had fallen in love, and he was going to be spending the upcoming cold season with his intended. He was so sorry, but how could he interfere with Tal’s Will? He had no say when it came to the whims of an omega’s heart. 

Jimin had no intended, and while he could have had his pick of any of the alphas in Kangbyon, his father feared that keeping him in their village by the river would never keep him safe. He needed to send him away, where the Sangilions couldn’t get to him. Ironically, that meant sending him closer to the foot of the mountain, to Haedoji, to a village as old as their people. The second largest Taliian settlement, second only to the sprawling villages that had sprung up on Jeju over the last fifty years. Even with their proximity, there was no way the Sangilions would threaten the Shore Pack. Even those who were absolutely mad feared the Prime. His Jimin would be safe there; far, far from the sense of something horrifying that seemed to float on the air whenever the wind blew from the north, whenever a storm blew down from the mountains and the rain and snow seemed to carry with it a sense of distress and hate. 

 

\-----☽✮☾-----

 

**Five Years Earlier**

_The Island of Baengnyeong  
_

_The Chayuroun Tribe_

 

They saw the boats coming. They didn’t try to hide. The warriors gathered their weapons and went out to meet them. Standing in a solid line, they acted as a barrier between the village and those inside who could not so easily defend themselves. Jeongguk’s palms were sweaty. This would be his first real battle since he came of age. At just past fourteen, his first Heat had been last year- now an adult among his people. No enemy had dared to brave their shores since then, so Jeongguk had not yet been called to defend. Now? He would fight. He fingered the blade of the axe tucked into the loops of his belt, the sharp edge would have broken the skin if he’d used even a touch more force. Soon, they would be biting into the flesh of those who dared to attack them…

His father’s rasping whistle caught his ears from farther down the line and Jeongguk turned to search for his familiar face until at last he caught sight of a pair of bright eyes fixed on him. He clutched an axe of his own in his big fist. His father tipped his chin up in acknowledgment and Jeongguk whistled back. It was their way of telling each other to come back safely, but it was also their way of saying goodbye should one of them die….

“Watch the left side, Jeongguk-ah.” Gyeonghun muttered, nudging Jeongguk in the ribs to redirect his attention. His cousin was a few years older than him and had fought two battles so far. They stood farther down the line, near the end. Most of the time invaders would charge straight for the village so they put their strongest defenders near the center with the weakest and the newest upholding the wings. Jeongguk hoped one day he would earn a place at the heart of the battle.

The boats scrapped the shore, an eerie echo of rock on wood floating up from the beach. It seemed that the whole island was holding its breath. He could see the invaders moving around on the beach down below, but he knew that because of the angle they could not see them. From there the invaders looked tiny, like children’s playthings. It was hard to believe that these people were more than likely hostile and dangerous, violent heathens intent on stealing and plundering.

Another whistle cut into the air from the right, warning them to get ready. Jeongguk closed his eyes, felt the steadiness of the earth beneath his feet, listened to the prayers of his packmates as they asked Jayu to protect them on this day.

There was a sharp twang of a bow and Jeongguk opened his eyes to see a flaming arrow fly through the air and sink into the sand far below. A warning shot. To let the invaders know they were watching. Now was the time for them to declare they were peaceful.

No one ever declared they were peaceful.

The Chayuroun had came here, to the island of Baengnyeong, to make a place for omegas to live without the constant threat of alpha violence hanging over their heads. Whenever someone heard of their existence, they sought to capture them, like a prized jewel for their crown. The ultimate show of dominance and power to conquer the village of omegean warriors and claim them as their own. 

Jeongguk’s lips moved, his own prayers joining those of his fellow warriors as the figures on the beach paused. He could almost imagine he saw their heads turn in their direction.

Then he heard the laughter.

Deep and throaty. Delighted. Unhinged.

A chorus of laughter followed, a bit more tittering and nervous, but still; they were laughing.

The sound of their mirth crashed against the waiting omegas in the same way that the echo of waves on the shore washed over the village at night, far away and distant but doing nothing to belay the power of the sea.

They waited.

When the invaders crested the hill, weapons in hand, they were ready.

“Go!”

Jeongguk lifted his axe and ran. His feet hit the dirt, punching holes into the soft ground as his boots struggled for purchase in the loamy soil. The enemy did not hesitate to run forward as well. Jeongguk picked up speed at the sight of them, tightening his fingers around the handles of his axes he found himself pushing forward ahead of the others.

He felt a growl crawl up the inside of his throat, from that place that only seemed to come alive in battle. He’d never experienced it outside of the sparring pit before, but now… He screamed, his eyes settling on a short wolf clad in the orange furs of a fox. Leaning into the wind, he ran straight for him. As he neared him, he turned to the side, counted his steps, plotted his exact path until the moment his axe would meet flesh. He bared his teeth as he reached him. The man raised a club studded with vicious looking spikes and just before their bodies crashed together Jeongguk lowered his body and swung. The man lifted a shield just in time, managing to throw his weight behind it and catch Jeongguk in the shoulder, throwing him off balance. Pain shot up Jeongguk’s arm and for a moment black spots exploded behind his eyes as the breathe wheezed out of his lungs. The invader raised his club again and Jeongguk planted his foot just as he swung, spinning out of the way. He raised his axe and sunk it into the back of the man’s neck on the downswing.

The invader dropped like a stone and Jeongguk stood there, shocked, as blood dripped from his blade to color the hillside. He scrambled backwards, try to get steady on his feet, to put some distance between himself and the man he’d just killed. Someone threw a knife and it soared past Jeongguk’s head handle over blade. It narrowly missed him, grazing his ear with a sharp sting and a gush of warmth that he belatedly realized was blood trickling down his neck.

The man who had thrown the knife was stalking towards him now and Jeongguk gagged at the sight of spilled Chayurouni blood covering his chest and arms. Who did that belong to? Who had they lost already?

“Gyeonghun!” He called out to his cousin, but he was completely out of sight now.

Jeongguk looked around him, there was something churning in his gut that he’d rarely felt in his life before. He realized it was panic. His arm was shaking, his grip on his axe was tremulous at best. He couldn’t think straight. There was no way he could fight this behemoth of a man off by himself. Why was he by himself? He’d never fought a real battle before, he-

He thought of his father. His strong hands and his deep, booming voice. And their home, the fire flickering in the hearth and his mother and brother, a bearer himself now, hiding in the cellar with the pups. The forest with the little glade he liked to hide in some mornings to avoid his chores.

He ran.

He turned and he ran. Farther down the line, away from the invader who had challenged him. He thought that at any second he would be brought down by a blade in his back but it never came. Up the hillside, towards where the center of the line was supposed to be holding fast. Jeongguk was shocked to find nothing but carnage. And beyond that, at the top of the slope, smoke.

The village was on fire.

He ran again.

He pumped his arms and legs as he tore up the slope to the village. A woman leapt from the tree line shrieking as she aimed to run him down, but her shriek was cut off as Gyeonghun came out of nowhere, plowing into her with a knife. He dragged the blade across the woman’s throat, dropping her where she stood. He fell into step beside Jeongguk as they ran towards the village.

The screaming was crystal clear.

Invaders pulled people from their houses, running them through where they stood. He saw Hajung, small and slight, drop to the ground, a trickle of blood coming from the corner of her mouth, and he screamed,

“ _Hajung!_ ” Her name was raw in his throat.

He sank to his knees, head swimming. Gyeonghun ran forward to challenge the man who had just murdered a teacher of children. He died.

Jeongguk saw him die.

He saw him die.

He saw him die.

He saw him die. 

There was a crunch of boots behind him and before he could even react pain blossomed in the back of his head as what he vague realized was probably the hilt of a knife smashed into his skull.

And the world went dark.

 

\-----☽✮☾-----

 

When he awoke the smell of burned flesh and charred wood made him retch. He rolled over to the side and vomited. He spat the acrid taste of bile from his mouth and struggled to sit up, realized that his hands were bound behind his back. A soft moan told him that he was not alone, squinting into the darkness he recognized the subdued forms of some of his agemates, young wolves bound and piled up like cords of firewood. He was the only one who seemed to have their wits about him.

He tried to think fast as he realized just how dire of a situation he was in, that this might be his only chance to get away. He had no idea if anyone was even watching them, or if someone would be coming back soon, but he rolled onto his side and tried to pull his feet underneath him. The trees above him seemed to sway and bend as his stomach roiled. He managed to struggle to his feet.

His first few steps were unsteady and faltering but he managed to find his rhythm and made a stumbling path towards the tree line. He didn’t make it far before someone spotted him. 

Someone sounded the alarm and he forced himself to pick up the pace. If only he could make it to the trees… he knew the forest better than anyone, he could hide there and wait for them to leave. He could find other survivors and then they could go rescue the captives. Everything would be alright if he could just make it to the trees.

Someone was running. Behind him. Someone was running after him. Jeongguk glanced over his shoulder and saw a young alpha with a bow in hand chasing after him. The alpha was gaining on him fast. If Jeongguk could just make it to the trees he could hide; he could shift into his wolfskin and make his way deeper into the forest, find a hollow to hide away in where they would never be able to reach him.

He glanced back again and this time they made eye contact. For one moment Jeongguk thought the alpha was going to let him get away. The man slowed, falling back, but then he yanked an arrow free from the quiver over his shoulder and pulled back the string.

The shot was clean. 

There was a wet pop as the arrow embedding itself in Jeongguk’s left shoulder. His pulse pounded in his ears as the forest went quiet around him and he looked down to see the head of the arrow pushing through the leather of his vest. The world tilted and he landed so hard on the ground it knocked the air from his lungs. He pressed his face into the damp dirt, panting and coughing.

The alpha’s boots crunched against the ground next to his head and he crouched down next to Jeongguk,

“Sorry, kid.” he whispered.

More footsteps approached and someone reached down, snatching up a handful of Jeongguk’s hair as they pulled him to his feet. The arrow wedged in the joint of his shoulder radiated a hot pain down into his arm, neck, and back. He tried to swallow around another mouthful of bile as another alpha pulled him by the tangle of his braids back through the forest to what was left of his village.

  
\-----☽✮☾-----

  
The rosy colors of dawn were making their first greeting to the horizon as the invading wolves decided to make camp on the beach of a distant island. A pair of hands gripped Jeongguk beneath the shoulders, lifting him from the floor of the boat. His shoulder was stiff and painful, arrow still lodged deep in his flesh. He cried out as the same young alpha who had shot him moved him. The man hushed him,

“Be quiet. Don’t anger them…” In his exhausted daze Jeongguk heard the murmur of voices nearby, the crackle of fire and the sounds of people awakening. For just a moment his fear returned, and with a whimper he struggled in the arms of the man supporting him, but he held on tight until Jeongguk’s protests stopped. He was too tired. His body felt bruised and sore, and more than anything he wanted to sleep.

The man lifted him easily in his arms, carrying him somewhere away from the bright fire and the voices of the others. Wherever it was, it was warm. The wind was gone, and a bed of soft furs reached up to embrace him body as the man set him down. Jeongguk welcomed it, and within minutes he had fallen into a deep sleep.

Waking up was a surreal experience. He had slept outside of his family home before, but those times had been few and far between. He was used to wooden log walls and the cozy warmth of a nearby fire. The smell of cooking or the sounds of his pack would awaken him, and he would reluctantly drag himself off his cot to help his mother prepare the morning meal while he waited for the fog of sleep to leave his mind.

When he next awoke he’d been placed back in the boat and the white-hot heat in his shoulder ached all the way into his ears, making his head feel like it was going to crack open. Hours passed in a blur of waking and sleeping until he wasn’t sure if he was dead of alive. The boat slowed as they approached the shore and the scrape of the hull against rocky ground grated in his ears. The rest of his agemates sat in silence as they waited for the alphas to come for them and they moved obediently from the boat to the waiting cart. Since his legs were still bound, Jeongguk had to be carried.

The cart was loaded with things that were stolen from their village; goods and produce and even some livestock. They moved uphill and the omegas curled up tighter together in the bottom of the cart. The cart didn’t stop until the air turned cold with the setting sun and the scent of fire heralded the presence of people.

Then there was cheering.

The sort of joyous crying and praise that awaited warriors coming home to mates and children after a battle well fought. The sounds of mourning as families realized someone they loved wasn’t coming home.

The invaders left them alone in the cart for awhile longer, when the cart finally shook open Jeongguk couldn’t help but cringe.

Rough hands grabbed him and he winced against the pain it sent running through his back. The ropes binding his legs and hands were cut and hands pulled at his legs, sliding him to the end of the cart. As he was lifted up the arrow caught on something and he groaned. His insides churned like the violent sea and his eyes flew open to see the face of the young alpha who had shot him hovering above him.

He blinked, trying to bring his face into focus for a moment before his eyes rolled back in his head. When he managed to pry them open again, he was on the ground. Inside a house, it seemed. Or maybe it was a barn? Some kind of storehouse.

A calloused hand pressed against his face. “He’s burning up.”

“It’s probably an infection.” Another voice said, “Get him on the table.”

Arms lifted him from the floor again and the room spun around him. They sat him on the table, support his body for a moment as someone moved around behind him. He felt the cold press of a blade against his flesh and for a moment he thought this was where he was going to die. Here, on a filthy table far from home.

Instead there was a flick of the blade and a terrible moment of pressure before the knife cut through the shaft of the arrow protruding from the back of his shoulder. They laid him back on the table and immediately fingers fumbled with the ties of his vest, tearing his shirt to reach the place where the head of the arrow had punched through his shoulder.

Fingers probed at the swollen, hot flesh around the arrow and Jeongguk’s hand flew up automatically to stop whoever it was, but at the same time he couldn’t resist whimpering;

“Get it out…” Hot tears gathered in the corners of his eyes.

“We will.” The alpha reassured him and Jeongguk wanted to believe that the concern he heard in his voice was genuine, but this was the man who had shot him in the first place, who had invaded his home, who had more than likely murdered his packmates, and who had stolen him away for who knows what terrible purposes.

Another shadow stepped in front of him and small, soft, cool hands pressed gently around the arrowhead as well. Another groan rose in his throat, but the woman’s touch was much lighter than the alpha’s had been. She smelled like a beta.

“We should wait for Bada…” she murmured.

“She’s with the pack wounded, Sooman wants her there. He said to leave the slaves for last. It would be a test of their resilience.”

The woman shook her head. “He’ll die if we wait…”

“Take it out.” The alpha said, his eyes pulled with worry.

She nodded, her face grim and Jeongguk panicked momentarily at the idea of what was obviously a novice healer attempting the extraction, but he knew he didn’t have a choice. He had never in his life felt pain like this. The beta pressed a strip of leather between his teeth and he bit down hard, pulling in a deep breath and pining his eyes on the rafters high above. The alpha moved around behind where Jeongguk lay on the table, hooking his arm beneath Jeongguk’s head to brace the back of his head so he wouldn’t knock his head against the wood and Jeongguk held onto him with shaking fists.

The shaft of the arrow cracked, releasing an explosion of white behind his eyes. Jeongguk groaned, twisting his hands in the fabric of the alpha’s tunic as the beta dug at what remained of the chunk of wood embedded in his flesh. She managed to catch it with her fingernails. When she had a firm grip on it she paused and gave Jeongguk a moment to catch his breath.

“Ready?” Jeongguk gave a quick nod and she yanked her arm back, pulling the spike of wood free.

Jeongguk bucked beneath the alpha’s weight and then his body went limp as blood gushed anew from the wound. The alpha slammed a clean sheet of cloth down on the freshly opened wound and clamped down hard to stem the flow. So hard that Jeongguk couldn’t breathe. He blinked slowly, trying to see, but it was like his eyes had stopped working, and then the pain overtook him and, once again, everything went dark.

  
\-----☽✮☾-----

 

When Jeongguk opened his eyes the thin blue light of morning seeped between the wooden boards of what he could now clearly see was a barn. He sat up on the table, stiff from lying on the hard surface all night. The throbbing began almost instantly, forcing tremors and trembles from his abused body. He reached a hand beneath his ruined shirt and gently touched the hot, inflamed hole in his shoulder, closed and puckered by a few hastily done stitches. He rolled his wrists, feeling the raw, pink skin pull sharply where the ropes binding his hands behind his back had been.

His bare feet found the cold ground as he slid off the table and he wondered briefly where his boots had gone. Through the planks that made up the walls he could see a silent village stretching up the mountain side towards an ominous looking concrete building. The deep green of pine trees surrounded the village like a thick wall.

He made his way to the door and tried to lift the latch, but when he pushed the door didn’t budge; it was barred from the outside. Overwhelmed, he huddled down into a corner, wrapping his arms around himself tightly against the cold.

And he waited.

He must have dozed, leaning against the wall where he squatted in the corner, because when he awoke there was a girl standing over him, small and lithe with a head topped with a crown of winding black braids. He jerked to his feet, fists raised, ready to defend himself at the first sign of aggression. She held up a hand to stop him and the movement brought with it the distinct smell of omega. The first omega he’d met since he arrived.

“I’m here to check your wounds and help you clean up.” She said, one hand still clutching the woven shawl draped over her shoulders against the cold. A basket rested in the crook of her arm. “If you try to hurt me, I’d be happy to let you die of that infection.” She nodded to the spot of fresh blood that was beginning to seep through his mangled shirt, the pain finally registered and he realized belatedly that he must have torn his stitches free.

The girl was about his size, maybe a few centimeters shorter, but by the more mature scent he guessed that she was a few years older than him. She was too clean and soft to be a warrior, but there was something about her that spoke of a hard life. Still, he knew it wouldn’t take anything more than a couple of steps and then he could have his hands around her neck. The door was still cracked open behind her. He could subdue her, maybe not kill her, and make a break for it.

She moved towards him warily, her dark eyes narrowed as she inspected his face. He could feel a bulge where his cheek was swollen, probably from his fall in the woods, and a crack in his lip. She swung her basket onto the table and set a pot on the ground. Near the back of the barn was a smooth patch of hard, compact dirt; probably for easy cleaning and drainage. In just a few moments, she managed to light a small fire from the selection of kindling and twigs piled against the far wall, all the while watching Jeongguk from the corner of her eye.

She handed him a small loaf of bread and he couldn’t resist the temptation to tear it apart and stuff it in his mouth with grimy fingers. He knew he should probably be more cautious of mind altering drugs or poison, but he was starving.

She touched his uninjured shoulder gently and urged him to sit down on the table. She pulled a few vials and a wad of cotton from her basket, dousing the rag in some foul smelling tincture that reeked of antiseptic. She shoved his ruined shirt from his shoulder and he fought a blush at the exposed expanse of his chest.

“They tore a bit but it’s not worth restitching. You’ll have a bit more of a scar that’s for sure but this will hold. She dabbed the cotton at the wound and he hissed, the burn of the antiseptic both unsettling and reassuring at the same time. She slathered an ointment over the stitches that stunk almost more than the antiseptic and then wrapped his shoulder in a length of clean white bandage.

“Hold here.” She said, pressing the end of the bandage against his chest. His hand rose obediently to hold it in place as she unrolled it at an angle across his chest and around his shoulder. As she leaned around him to secure the bandage he noticed that there was a collar of metal around her neck that gleamed in the flickering firelight. He could see no clasp or seam, she must wear it always…

She took a seat near the fire on a straw pallet that she drug from another corner. In her lap she was preparing what looked like food, mixing the contents in a smooth, oval-shaped piece of stone serving as a crude bowl. The girl looked at him nervously, a quick glance out of the corner of her eye, continuing with her work as Jeongguk took in his surroundings.

“Where am I?” Jeongguk said at last. It wasn’t what he wanted to do. It wasn’t even what he wanted to say. What he wanted to do was scream. Fight. He could kill the girl. Easily. A quick glance around the room revealed at least a dozen things he could use to kill her and fight his way to freedom. But he didn’t know her. She smelled like an omega, like him. She was most likely innocent. And if he killed her, he would have no idea what was waiting for him on the other side of that door. He doubted he could even make it very far past the door without her help. So he asked instead, again. “What is this place?”

Instead of answering his question the girl said,

“They sent me to tend to you." Unlike the alphas he’d encountered so far, whose words were mottled and hard to understand at times by an accent he was unfamiliar with, her voice held an foreign cadence that sounded both sweet and strange to Jeongguk's ears, but the language was clear and understandable.

“Why would they do that? They tried to kill me… they killed everyone…”

“Our people travel far.” She said, “It is in our nature.” The words sounded practiced; rehearsed.

“It’s in your nature to burn villages to the ground and kidnap the survivors?”

She gave Jeongguk a sympathetic look. "To them, you are one of our enemies. Some of them would have killed you if not for the words of our alpha.”

“Why did they bring me here?" Jeongguk said. "This is your home, isn't it? Your village?"

The girl nodded, her eyes haunted with fear and sadness as the initial tension between the two of them began to ebb. "It is not unusual for our warriors to bring back slaves. But you...our Alpha Heir Apparent has not taken an omega yet. He spoke of finding one of your people before… rumors of the Chayurouni reached our shores maybe a much as five years ago? But I never thought he’d actually seek you out. When he saw you he must have desired you very much, to order the guards to watch you the way he did.”

Jeongguk frowned, “Why would he want one of my people? Besides, I am too young. I haven’t even reached my sixteenth year yet.”

The girl looked down suddenly, no longer even attempting to make eye contact with him. "He will not take you as his mate yet. It would not be proper. I can't speak of what he truly desires from you. It is not my place.”

“I would not know how to be his mate," Jeongguk said at last, his head swimming as he began to feel overwhelmed. He put a palm on the table to steady himself as he wobbled.

The girl's smile took on a bemused, anxious quality. She picked up her bowl again and handed it to Jeongguk. "Here, eat. You must be very hungry."

He was. The bowl contained a paste that tasted of mashed nuts, made palatable by a sprinkling of dried berries. There was little flavor to it, but it was not unpleasant. After swallowing down the whole bowlful and drinking from a waterskin the girl offered, Jeongguk began to feel a little better. His bladder was full, and the anxious knot in his stomach still remained, but at least he was no longer starving.

“And... how long will I stay here?" Jeongguk said at last.

"For as long as our alpha says you must. He has told the others to treat you as one of our own, but they will be watching closely. You will not try to leave, will you?" She added the last sheepishly, as though it was a question asked out of obligation rather than desire. As if the girl knew… no one would want to stay here. He glanced at the glint of metal around her neck. The collar itself was a glaring signal that the girl herself was most likely here against her will.

Jeongguk shook his head. He didn’t know what he was denying; that he wouldn't hurt them or that he could ever willingly stay here. But the thought of making the journey back across the open seas by himself was even more frightening than staying put. He had no idea what he would find if he made his way back home to Baengnyeong.

"What is your name?" the girl asked.

"Jeongguk."

"I am Seulgi." She smiled. The bright and eager sparkle that might have lit the young woman's eyes if she were to have grown up anywhere else was muted, but it still did much to put Jeongguk’s fears to rest. Aside from the collar around her neck and the sound of her voice, she could almost have been a Chayurouni girl.

"Come," Seulgi said. "I will show you where you can wash, and then he will want to see you.”

Jeongguk shielded his eyes from the glare of the sun as Seulgi locked the heavy wooden door with a key that hung on a leather thong that wrapped around her wrist.

The thin winding road Seulgi had lead him up snaked through the village and up the slope of the mountainside. Above them, houses sat beside and behind each other in uneven rows. Some of them were so new that the wood still smelled fresh cut while others were so dilapidated that they were nothing more than a lean-to made to keep out the cold. Smoke from the many fires inside floated up from the roofs, fading into a fog that hugged the tops of the pine trees and wreathed the mountain peaks, blocking them from sight.

While Seulgi did her best to take a quiet route, they still passed by a handful of dwellings on their way. The people stared at Jeongguk unashamedly as he walked past. He had never before felt so interesting, or so different. In the rare moments he chanced to lock eyes with one of the villagers he found himself looking for signs of fear or hatred. He was, after all, their enemy.

Most regarded him with obvious discomfort, but rarely did he feel threatened. Any animosity they might have felt for him seemed restrained by a veneer of curiosity. It was far from reassuring, but some of the tension in his stomach loosened. He had been expecting snarling wolves and bared fangs, but these people didn’t appear to be monsters… just people.

At the top of the slope sat an imposing concrete building. It looked ancient, much like the ruins of the Pre-Desolation military bases back on Baengnyeong, but he had been told his whole life that those places were dangerous, haunted by malevolent spirits and rife with evil energies that would like nothing more than to bring a curse down upon the village if they were disturbed.

Eventually, Seulgi lead him to a large stone building with a heavy wooden door. She tugged it open and a smog of steam escaped. He followed her inside and realized that it was a bathhouse, but it was nowhere as extravagant or as well-kept as the bathhouse he visited with his father and his brother. The large central pool was full of water but it looked like it hadn’t been drained in awhile and he could see a film of soap and oils on the surface from bathers past. There were linen towels hanging next to plain robes, but the material seemed rough and there was a distinct scent of mildew in the air. He turned to find that Seulgi had disrobed, and he flushed; averting his eyes.

Seulgi stepped into the water and waited patiently for a moment as if she intended to help him bathe. When Jeongguk didn't join her she rose from the pool and began to help the omega out of his clothing. Jeongguk blushed bright red and hurriedly began to remove his shirt himself. He was not used to being around girls so comfortably and he definitely wasn’t ready for one to be undressing him.

On his island, there were only omegas and betas. There was an expectation that as a male omega he would either mate with a woman or maybe a male beta, and so he had been kept away from both options, outside of his battle training, for the past few years since he’d entered puberty for the sake of maintaining ‘his virtue’.

He wasn’t quite to the stage where he really found anyone to be sexually attractive but he could acknowledge that Seulgi was a very pretty omega. If they had been back home; he might have considered her as a mate some day. The collar around her neck gave him the impression that that would be no choice for her. He didn’t think either he or Seulgi would be getting much of a say about anything in their future.

“You should make yourself clean and beautiful for our alpha.” She murmured, “He will appreciate that. If you leave me your clothes I will wash them and find fresh ones while you bathe."

Jeongguk nodded. The evening was warm, and he was glad to feel the cool air against his skin as he untied and slid out of the woolen trousers and linen undergarments he wore, shrugged out of his ruined shirt, and finally stepping out of his boots to stand naked on the cold stone floor of the bathhouse.

She went to the edge of the pool and fiddled with a spout and a lever. Water rushed in through a pipe and he could hear the gently sucking of water as it drained out much more slowly from a grate near the bottom of the pool. Seulgi guided him to enter the gently flowing water, fed into the bathhouse from a hot spring outside, before bundling up the pile of clothes and tucking them beneath her arm.

She handed him a chunk of soap and then left Jeongguk alone, pulling a thin robe over her nude form as she disappeared into a back room, giving him time to see to his private needs and wash. Perhaps she had sensed his discomfort and decided to leave him to his own devices, regardless he was grateful for the apparent change in plans.

Even though they had only just met, Seulgi's absence brought an uncomfortable feeling of tension to everything he did. This wasn’t right. She wasn’t right. There were things she wasn’t telling him. These people…. he screwed his eyes shut as visions of fire and blood again screamed in his head. These people had fallen on his village in the dead of night and slaughtered everyone Jeongguk had ever known or loved. And now this girl, this girl with sad eyes and a collar of metal around her neck like a shackle… like she was a piece of livestock to keep track of and control.

Wash and make yourself pretty for our alpha, she had said, he’ll appreciate it… 

For one wild moment he considered running outside and pitching himself in the mud. Wallowing in it like a pig. If they were going to treat him like an animal, then he should behave like one, right?

Were those his choices now? Pampered pet or mangy stray? If he chose to bite the hand that would feed him, what would happen? If he didn’t play their games, would he die like the rest of his village?

If he did play their games… if he waited and watched and pretended, then maybe he could kill their alpha. Avenge his family, his friends, his village…

With a sigh, Jeongguk leaned back in the warm water, floating for a moment before he began to unfastened the metal clasps from his hair. Like all young Chayurouni Warriors, Jeongguk’s hair was pulled back in a series of braids that kept the length of it out of his face and allowed him to move freely without distraction in battle. He would not cut his hair until he left the ranks of warriors to bear children. If he mated with a woman then he might never cut it. He had been growing it out now for a little over a year; since he entered puberty last summer, only trimming it to maintain its health. It hung to just below his shoulders, but his father’s braids reached his hips, and even farther when it was unbound.

He loosened his braids and dipped his head below the water. He floated on his back, letting his hair fan out around his head as he tried to ease his mind. Would they let him keep his hair? He hadn’t seen very many of their men yet, but the ones he had seen had short hair cut close to the scalp. He didn’t know if they could bear it… if they forced him to cut his hair.

His thoughts were interrupted by the sound of someone approaching, and he jolted upright with a splash. It was only Seulgi, returning to the bath chamber from wherever she’d gone with a bundle of fresh clothes and a reassuring smile. Jeongguk relaxed and allowed himself to sink back into the water again, but the other omega's presence spurred him to continue washing, lathering the soap into his long tresses and rinsing the dirt and grime from his hair.

The bandage around his shoulder slowly soaked up the water and he wondered how hygienic that could possibly be, but Seulgi hadn’t offered to help him unwrap it, and he couldn’t reach it on his own so he resigned himself to the sodden covering and moved to scrub the rest of his body. A thin coloring of dirt and blood swirled in the water around him as he washed away all signs of the battle.

Once he had bathed, Seulgi helped him out of the pool and handed him one of the slightly damp towels to dry himself with. It was rougher than the soft material he was used to. As Jeongguk sat on a bench drying himself off, Seulgi knelt behind him and brushed the tangles from his hair with finely carved comb made from what he suspected was bone.

"What happens next?" Jeongguk asked.

"We'll let your hair dry by the fire, then make sure you are as beautiful as we can make you. Once the sun goes down I will take you to our Alpha. I warn you, you must be on your best behavior. He will decide where you belong tonight. The way you behave will determine your place in this pack... The worse you act, the worse it will be. Do you understand? This is not a moment for defiance, Jeongguk.”

He was grateful when she helped him remove the wet dressing, replacing it with another length of bandage. He dressed in the clothes she brought. Simple linen garments like the ones she wore. They would not be very warm, if he were caught outside, and she did not provide him with any shoes. Her own feet were bare as well, he noted. The soles were rough and calloused, and though she had taken a moment to wash them in the pool while he bathed, he remembered that before they had been quite dirty. It did not seem that she wore shoes often, if ever. He wondered what would happen to the leather boots he had been wearing when he arrived? The ones his mother had paid a small fortune to have crafted especially for him...

There seemed little left for them to do but wait at that point. Seulgi helped him braid his hair once it dried, twisting it back behind his head and out of his face. Jeongguk's inevitable meeting with the alpha loomed larger than ever after everything he'd learned that evening, and without Seulgi's company he might have driven himself insane with worry.

The minutes passed by and Jeongguk’s gaze kept returning time and again to the bathhouse door. The evening chill was beginning to seep in, and soon he couldn't tell whether the trembling of his body was due to the cold or his mounting anxiety. He was a warrior damn it! But he had never faced an alpha before… not like this…

At last, after an hour or more had slipped by, a middle-aged beta woman appeared in the doorway. She peered down the gently sloping floor at them. Her gaze lingered on Jeongguk, then she frowned and spoke a few harsh words to Seulgi in an accented voice so thick Jeongguk couldn’t understand. Seulgi bowed, bobbing her head in acknowledgment.

"Come," she said softly. "It's time.”

They followed the beta woman up the winding road, between the strange clusters of buildings and up towards the ancient concrete building, lit up now with what he imagined could only be a monstrous fire. People were filing into the building, heads bowed and shoulders hunched. The front doors were made of wood, but they didn’t seem to be native to the structure. They stood wide open and the scent of heavily perfumed smoke and roasting meat filled the air.

The beta woman lead them inside and pointed them towards a corner where a small huddle of omegas stood. Seulgi joined them and another girl grabbed her, looking her over carefully, a small wrinkle of worry appearing between her brows as she glanced at Jeongguk out of the corner of her eye. Seulgi smiled at her, cupping the unfamiliar omega’s hand to her cheek.

“I’m fine, Joohyun.” She whispered, “He’s harmless.”

Jeongguk almost snorted, he was far from harmless, but stopped the sound before it managed to escape him and travel too far. Instead he turned his eyes to examine the hall. Long tables lined what must have at one point been an aircraft hanger of some sort. Planes still existed in their Post-Desolation world but they were small and only the Walls seemed to have them. Once, when he was a child he saw one fly overhead and it had scared him, but his grandmother had explained to him what it was. She’d even taken him to one of the old military buildings and explained, from a safe distance so as to not disturb the spirits, how the large empty box of a building was meant to store them, repair them, and keep them safe from the elements. This building was smaller, but it looked similar.

The ceilings were high and the windows that once must have been filled with industrial glass were in pieces; patched with bits of colorful stained glass, but still filthy. It was obvious no one had climbed up there and cleaned them in ages. A hole dominated the center of the ceiling, but it was covered by a haphazard construct of wood. A rope hung from it, draped over a pulley affixed to the wall. It appeared that the rope could be used to manipulate the covering, opening it to let out the smoke produced by the massive fire in the middle of the room. It put off so much heat he could feel sweat beading along his hairline. He couldn’t imagine how those setting near it were coping.

His eyes ran over the wolves gathered here. Judging by the scent all those who sat at the long tables were either alphas or betas. A few omegas sat docile and obedient, he knew them by the collars around their necks, glinting dully in the firelight. Mostly they sat stock still, heads bowed and hands folded demurely in their laps. Every once in awhile one of them would reach out and fill a glass or place another slice of meat on a plate without ever being asked, and the alphas and betas continued to eat and drink without ever acknowledging or thanking them. It was like they were expected to see and meet the needs of others before they even knew they needed something. He shuddered to think of what would happen if they failed.

Seulgi and her friends stood next to a door in their corner. He wondered why, what their purpose was, until the door opened and someone passed out a platter of food and Seulgi took it, moving towards a nearby table and replacing an empty platter with the new one. She brought empty platter back and placed it in a slot next to the door where it slid out of sight. Jeongguk stood by awkwardly, wondering if he should help, but he didn’t know the first thing about what he should be doing, so he just watched. All the omegas were dressed in the same thin robes, modest but not suited for any kind of weather one might encounter outdoors. They would offer no warmth, no protection from the sun, wind, or rain, and every single one of them was barefoot. The metal rings around their necks were uniform, and upon closer inspection he noticed a small loop on each one.

Joohyun passed him with a jug of dark colored liquid, presumably wine judging by the alcoholic stench, and he watched as she seemed to shrink in on herself as she moved through the table beyond the fire, approaching a table set up high on a raised platform. A selection of wolves sat there, alphas judging by their arrogant stature and hard gazes. She moved down the line, filling glasses and avoiding eye contact. Seated at the exact center was a small alpha, older than all the rest by at least twenty years it seemed. His hair was graying and his face was lined with wrinkles, deep frown lines around his mouth. Next to him sat a considerably younger alpha, handsome and tall, laughing riotously at something the woman next to him said. Something about him made the hairs on the back of Jeongguk’s neck stand up. He made his skin crawl.

Joohyun reached the old alpha’s side and the man’s hand reached out and rested on her waist. She bowed her head demurely as she filled his glass. He took the jug from her hands and set it aside, gesturing for her to take a seat next to him on the long bench. Her face remained impassive and cool, like sculpted stone, as she settled down next to him and assumed the same posture as all the other omegas in the room. Eyes lowered and hands clasped neatly in her lap. Another omega, a male this time, appeared out of nowhere and took up her jug, continuing down the table as if nothing had ever happened.

After a few moments the old alpha stood and raised a hand. A hush fell over the hall and when he spoke his voice was quiet but strong.

“Welcome back, my sons and daughters. You fought for your village well! You secured enough supplies to last us through the cold season with limited rationing. With any luck, by the time the thaw comes we’ll be ready to head out and conquer another unworthy foe.”

The cheering that arose from the gathered wolves made Jeongguk sick. This was his people’s deaths they were cheering for. Future murder they were planning.

“Hae calls on all alphas to fight for their pack. It is through blood and blood alone that we survive. Our mountain top does its best to sustain us but we must help her along. Hae gives us strength to fight, and we use it to secure our future. Praise Him!”

“Praise Him!” They gathered wolves responded.

“And when we please him, he gives us everything that we need. Including those we need to keep our numbers strong. Our brave warrior brought back with them a selection of fine omegean stock. Tomorrow morning they shall be available for purchase in the market. Please, make an offer to the retainer if you’re in need of a new household omega.”

Jeongguk reeled, shocked at the words coming out of the man’s mouth… he was speaking of his agemates! He almost didn’t realize that the man had continued speaking until Seulgi shoved him gently.

“…one amongst them, however, will not be available for purchase. He is destined for a higher purpose within the pack. Come forward, omega, and let us see you.”

Jeongguk stood stock still as silence descended upon the hall. Seulgi shoved him again and he stumbled.

“Omega! _Come_.” The old alpha called, this time his voice boomed and Jeongguk felt his heart stutter in his chest. His limbs jerked as, against his will, his feet began to guide him between the tables. He noticed, as if threw a fog, how all the other omegas in the room seemed to slump a little more as if the old alphas words were affecting them as well even if they weren’t directed at them. He knew what was happening then. The man had used his alpha voice to Command Jeongguk. He’d never been subjected to a Command before, there were no alphas where he came from, but he’d heard of it before. Been warned against it. He came to a stop before the old alpha, hands fisted at his sides, teeth gritted as he fought to regain control of his body. He raised his head to meet the eyes of the man who had summoned him.

Jeongguk almost wilted under his fierce gaze, but he forced himself not to look away. Perhaps bravery was akin to foolishness in this situation, but he hated the way the mere presence of so many alphas was making him feel. He needed to prove that he still had control over himself, in at least some way.

There was a low growl from one of the other alphas at the table but the old alpha raised a hand for silence.

“Omega. Welcome to Sangil. My name is Lee Sooman. I am the Head Alpha here.”

Jeongguk didn’t respond. The man raised a brow and continued.

“You should be grateful that my son chose to spare you. He saw you and thought that you would make a good mate some day. Strong, beautiful, healthy. You’ll give him glorious pups.” He clapped a hand down on the shoulder of the handsome young alpha next to him. “Of course, you’re young for it; but you’ll remain as a part of our household until then.”

Jeongguk’s gaze flicked to the young alpha and as his eyes met those of the grinning young man, he suddenly remember who he was, why he made that sick feeling rise and stick in his throat. This was the man who’d drug Jeongguk by his braids after he’d been shot. Phantom pain bloomed across his scalp as if to remind him of the abuse.

“No.”

A shocked silence followed his words, followed by nervous titters of laughter.

“No?” Repeated Sooman, a frown beginning to form as he looked Jeongguk up and down. “I’m afraid you don’t have much of a choice.”

Jeongguk sneered. “I’d rather die.”

Sooman sighed and took his seat. He waved a hand at Jeongguk,

“Take him away. Sell him with the others.” he frowned like it pained him to say it, but Jeongguk saw only slight bemusement on the old alphas face, like it was confused more than anything by Jeongguk’s refusal.

The young alpha next to him snarled as two guards grabbed Jeongguk and wrenched his arms behind his back. Sooman shook his head, his hand raising to bury itself in Joohyun’s hair as he spoke, “I’m sorry, Siwon. I can’t allow someone like him for you mate. Imagine the kind of poison he’d spread to the children.”

“Give the pups to your bitch.” He said, jerking his chin towards Joohyun. “She’s young enough to raise a few. I know you don’t want to ruin her figure but it won’t hurt her to take on a few she doesn’t bear herself!” He fixed his hungry gaze on Jeongguk as he struggled against the alphas restraining him. “I want him. He’s mine.”

“I’m sorry, son.” Sooman tilted him head in permission and the alphas dragged Jeongguk from the hall. “Your stubbornness has cost you dearly, boy.” The old alpha called after them, “I would have protected you; ensured your comfort. You would have lived lavishly. Now, you’ll know what it truly means to be an Omega of Sangil.”

The streets were dark and snow was falling lazily from the sky as they forced him back down the winding road. He considered shifting, using the instability of the slick ground to slip from their grasp and disappear into the forest. If he could just get four legs under himself, his paws on the ground, he might be able to outrun them. But when he tried to trigger the change it felt wrong, off somehow, and he knew his reserves were all used up from the wound healing on his shoulder. If he tried to force the change he might get stuck somewhere in between; not quite human not quite wolf. They tossed him back into the barn where he’d spent the day before Seulgi had come for him. His shoulder throbbed and he wondered if the stitches had torn a little more.

He crawled to the pallet of straw and collapsed there, his mind and body taxed.

 

\-----☽✮☾-----

 

The village slowly came to life with the sounds of livestock calling for their breakfast and the sharp scent of freshly stoked morning fires. The smell of toasted grain filled the air and Jeongguk’s stomach ached; the only thing he’d had to eat in days was the nut mash Seulgi provided him the day before. He closed his eyes and tried to push down the rolling nausea in his empty core.

It was an alpha’s voice that found him after hours of Jeongguk sitting in the damp cold, no way to rekindle the meager fire Seulgi had lit the day before. The door opened, swinging outward and letting the daylight flood inside. A gray haired man wearing a dirty shirt and a long black apron stepped inside. He looked too old to have been one of the invaders, but he stank of alpha. His eyes surveyed Jeongguk where he crouched in the corner like a frightened animal.

“Is he even of any use?” His snarled. “Yoona said he had an arrow in him when he arrived.”

The young alpha who’d shot Jeongguk stepped in behind him, ducking beneath the low doorframe. He was clean now, neatly shaven and in fresh clothes, a startling contrast to the dirty alpha before him. “He was one of their warriors. He looks strong, he could be of some use.”

The man snorted and spat on the ground. “He’s a child. I bet he’s as green as they come. He got caught, didn’t he? And he’s an omega on top of that. Omegas aren’t warriors. Just because he can pick up a weapon doesn’t mean he can do any damage with it. Besides, that wouldn’t be something he’d be allowed to do here anyway. Head Alpha will sell him off to a family to do housework until he has his first Heat and then he’ll be too busy whelping pups to think about much else.”

Jeongguk’s thoughts raced through his mind as he tried to comprehend what the filthy alpha was saying. Sooman had said he was too dangerous to be around the children, but maybe Siwon’s suggestion of someone else raising his pups would actually come to fruition… would they really force him to bear children and then take them from him? Give them to someone else to raise?

“Maybe no one will want him after his defiant display last night.” The young alpha said. “Maybe we should take him to the mainland and get something of value for him from the slavers. He’ll probably just spend the whole winter trying to escape anyway.”

“And what about the others?”

“They’re not like him. Younger. Softer. Not trained to fight. They’ll learn to fit in, but this one…” The young alpha locked eyes with Jeongguk as the omega stood slowly, the pain in his arm spreading across his chest as he looked between the two alphas.

“Sell me? Sell me to who?” He whispered.

The older alpha snarled and pulled his arm back like he intended to hit him, but the younger man stopped him. “One of the settlements on the mainland.” He answered Jeongguk.

“You can’t do that!”

“You better hold your tongue, omega. You have no say here.” the older alpha said curtly. He turned to the younger alpha, “We can’t sell him with an attitude like that, he’ll just run and we’ll never be able to trade with them again. Get him under control or kill him.”

And with that he turned and left. The alpha who had shot him stood looking at Jeongguk for a long time. They held eye contact but neither of them spoke. Finally he turned and left as well. He returned with a bundle of firewood. He set about relighting the fire and then shoved a metal pail over beside the fledgling flames. Then he left again.

Jeongguk waited a moment longer, partly out of fear but mostly out of stubbornness, before the warmth drew him in.

He sat on the overturned pail before the fire, inching closer to the warm the numbness in his fingers and toes. He tried to formulate some kind of escape plan… he could wait for dark and break through the wall of the barn, but what would he do then? What if they heard him? He had no idea where he was. He had no idea how big this island was. He didn’t know if there were other packs, if they were friendly, hostile, or more of the same. And there was no way he could get off the island without someone’s help. He could try to find his way back down to the docks and steal a boat, but he couldn’t follow the main road. They would find him for sure. So he would have to make his way through the forest, pick his way down the side of the mountain avoiding anyone and anything that might get him caught again. And what if he got lost? There was no way he could survive on this island- on this mountain- by himself all winter. Especially not with an infected wound festering in his shoulder.

He wondered what would happen to him now…

 

\-----☽✮☾-----

 

It was early the next morning, in the still hours before the sun began to rise when the door flew open once more. It slamming against the wall as Jeongguk sat up on the pitiful pallet. Hands grabbed him before he could even make out the forms moving in the shadows. He fought, trying to shift, to break free, but his wolf’s spirit was too exhausted, his body hadn’t healed enough to build up the reserves he needed to take his wolfskin and he was still too unpracticed to shift quickly.

A thick arm wrapped around his body sending his ribs into agony, and he fell limp as all the air whooshed from his lungs. They hauled him out the door into the still falling snow that stung his bare feet as he kicked at the ground in an attempt to get some kind of leverage to use against them.

“Where are you taking me?” He snarled, or at least he tried to, but his voice broke halfway through. One of the men leading them glanced back and he realized it was the same alpha from earlier, the one with the long beard and the dirty shirt. Before he could register his surprise the man reached back and slapped him in the face. Jeongguk’s head flew to the side, his mouth filled with blood.

“Speak again and I’ll cut your tongue out, omega.”

They walked through the village in silence, the snow biting into his bare feet. Somewhere near the opposite side of the village, closer to an area that looked like it was set up for commerce. The sound of a hammer on anvil pinged through the darkness, echoing up the silent mountainside. The orange glow of a forge lit the sky, illuminating the flecks of snow for just a moment before they melted in the intense heat of the air surrounding the smith.

They shoved him to his knees in the snow outside the front door where an anvil sat half buried in the accumulating drift. The door to the shop swung open and the man with the beard went inside, he returned a moment later tongs in hand. Jeongguk’s eyes went wide when he recognized the glowing metal clutched between the tongs for what it was; a collar, just like the one around Seulgi’s neck.

He screamed, tried to gain his feet and run, but they held him down, a hand fisted in his hair, wrenching his head up as the bearded man looked him over with a condescending expression. Jeongguk pushed back against their hold, trying to break free. The Blacksmith dropped the glowing collar on the anvil, hammering it to bend and stretch it to the right size and Jeongguk fought even more, shoving into the bodies behind him.

“If you’re still, I’ll be sure not to burn you.” The blacksmith sneered, his eyes planted firmly on Jeongguk’s neck.

Jeongguk looked around the village square, searching for someone to help him, something to fight with. There were tools everywhere, but nothing within reach. The hand in his hair pushed his face to the frozen anvil and another alpha leaned all his weight on Jeongguk’s body to keep him still.

Jeongguk screamed and thrashed, but they were too strong. The red hot metal ring moved closer as he kicked, but his bare feet only slid on the icy ground. Another man took hold of his shoulders and he was pinned, powerless. He grunted and sputtered as the blacksmith slowly spread the still-hot collar on the tongs and positioned it around his neck. He kicked again, this time finding a leg. The man holding him slipped on the ice from the force of the kick, jerking Jeongguk sharply in the process. His skin sizzled as the metal touched his throat and Jeongguk sucked in a choking breath, freezing instantly, becoming so still he wondered if he even still breathed.

“Hmph.” The blacksmith snorted, “I told you to be still.”

Jeongguk’s face pressed into the anvil, thick with snot and tears as they held him in place, letting the collar cool. The weight of the warm metal sat heavy around his neck.

After a moment they pulled him to his feet and lead him up the path towards the imposing concrete building where the village had gathered the night before. Once they stopped one of the men slipped a length of rope through the metal loop on the collar. They tied him to post outside the building and left him there shaking.

Jeongguk reached up and touched the burn that now scalded against the side of his neck, trying to make out his surroundings. It looked to be maybe an hour until dawn, but this high on the mountain the stars were still clear in the sky. He looked down at his feet, buried in the snow. The deep ache of cold was already pulsing up his legs and he feared that either hypothermia or frostbite would end him before anyone ever came for him again.

Two more of his Chayurouni agemates were brought out and tied to trees. They were nothing more than girls, one a little over eight and the other just having reached her tenth birthday a few weeks ago. The oldest stared off into the forest, her face blank.

Goats bleated in the distance.

More people arrived, setting up tables and stalls. He quickly realized that this was the beginning of a morning market; goods being set out for sale. Including him- just as the Pack Alpha had ordered. He kept his eyes on the ground, the voice in his head saying everything he didn’t want to believe. He was going to be bought and sold. He was going to live his life in chains; cooking and cleaning, and raising some alpha’s pups. He would never see his village again. He would never find out if his mother was still alive, if his father had survived the battle, if the Chayuroun Tribe even still existed in any form at all.

He would die here, a slave, and he would never see his home again. Not in this life or in the next. His heart broke inside his chest. All his hopes of escaping and finding a way home seemed so foolish now, especially as he looked upon the girls shivering next to him. He couldn’t leave them… His stomach roiled in anguish, but he tried not to let it show for the little ones who stood next to him.

Boots stepped into the snow in front of him and a deep laugh echoed through the square. 

“He’s a little thing, isn’t he?” The burn on his neck scorched like the summer sun and the infected wound caused the whole of the left side of his body to throb. “I couldn’t get a clear look at him last night. How much for him?”

“We’re looking for a trade in goods. I need a new addition on my cabin. You can pay in labor.”

Jeongguk could feel himself sinking deeper into the snow. The man shrugged and said if they still had him at the end of the day he might come back for him, but right now he didn’t have any time to be working on a big project like that. He moved on, taking more interest in the livestock a few pens down than he had in Jeongguk.

Another man stopped before them. He gestured to the oldest girl, the one who stared off into the forest. “What’s wrong with her?” He flung a careless hand in her direction.

“She’s in shock from the raid. She’ll snap out of it soon enough.”

“Ah. Well she won’t be much good for work until then will she?”

“She’ll do what you say easily enough. Omega, _come_.” The Command washed over Jeongguk making him feel lightheaded and sick, but he managed to resist it. The older girl turned her head and walk as close to the alpha as the rope around her neck would allow. The youngest girl huddled down into the snow, she wasn’t old enough to be influenced by Alpha Voice yet, and she had never seen it used before. It frightened her to see her companion behave so unlike herself.

Jeongguk’s hands balled into tight fists. He wanted to reach up and strangle the man with the rope that tied him to the post. He wanted to watch the light leave his eyes.

The alpha’s nostrils flared and he turned his head in Jeongguk’s direction. He stepped closer to Jeongguk and said, “How about you, omega?”

Jeongguk took a step back. “What?’

His hand shot out, snatching Jeongguk’s face by his bruised jaw, and he yanked him forward until the collar choked him, putting his face close to Jeongguk’s. Jeongguk’s eyes widened in shock as he felt the man’s fingers run up the inside of his thigh. Jeongguk yelped and tried to back away but he held him tight, moving with him.

“Get off me!” Jeongguk said, trying to sound menacing but it came out as more of a shriek. A smile pulled at the man’s lips, revealing disgusting teeth.

“Oh, little omega, I don’t usually go for the boys… but I like you. You’re coming with me, I think.”

Jeongguk pulled back and tried to aim a punch for the alpha’s face but the man dodged, twisting his arm behind his back, causing him to cry out again when it wrenched his wounded shoulder. People paused to watch, turning their heads in curiosity.

Then someone tapped the alpha on the shoulder.

“Please refrain from touching my omega.”

The man turned to reveal the young alpha who had shot him.

“Your omega?”

“Yes. He was my capture. Since Sooman rejected him from his household legal ownership falls to me, and I’ve decided not to sell him. My mother thinks that she’d like to keep him, we need the help around the house.”

The man sneered. “What if I don’t want to give him back? Would you challenge me, Minwoo?”

“Of course not. But I don’t have to. All I have to do is wait until your stupid enough to need Bada’s services and then watch you die. Then I can waltz right into your home and take him back.”

The man released Jeongguk with a shove. He spat on the ground at Minwoo’s feet and stalked away. Minwoo turned to Jeongguk and untied the rope from the post. He set off down the road immediately, rope wrapped around a tight fist as he forced Jeongguk to follow him at a fast trot. The Sangilions stopped to stare as he followed Minwoo through the falling snow like a dog, their hands stilling at their work to watch him. He didn’t meet any of their eyes as he passed them. He was disgraced. Weak. And every single one of them knew it.

He took him from the village square, back towards the small empty barn he’d spent the last couple of nights in. He stopped outside the door and Jeongguk bit down hard to keep his teeth from chattering together in the cold. Minwoo pulled out a knife and cut the rope free of the collar. His eyes dropped to Jeongguk’s feet and he cursed under his breath. He led the omega inside and quickly stoked the fire. Jeongguk sat down on the overturned pail, moving as close to the heat as possible. His feet were pale and numb, aching now that the blood was returning, but probably not frostbitten.

Minwoo dropped a blanket over his shoulders that smelled sharply of horse and then he knelt in front of Jeongguk, massaging his feet and calves to help summon the warmth back into them. He didn’t have the courage or the strength to protest the treatment. Instead, he observed the alpha.

Up close it became apparent that he was young, but not as young as Jeongguk had initially took him for. He was most likely a man, not a teenager. Probably in his early to mid twenties. He probably had as much as ten years on Jeongguk.

“How did you know I was out there?” Jeongguk asked, his voice rough from screaming so much.

The alpha looked like he didn’t want to answer. “I heard you… at the smith.”

Jeongguk closed his eyes and swallowed, thinking about the way he’d cried out and how they’d ignored him.

“Listen to me…” The alpha said suddenly, “I can keep you safe until the thaw, but I can’t keep you safe forever. Once the spring comes I’ll get you out of the village and then you’ll be on your own.” Jeongguk stared up at him with wide eyes, startled. “If you try to run before then, I won’t come after you, but you’d die out there in the snow within a day or two.”

“...where are we?”

“Saeloun. This is the village of Sangil, the Mountain Pack.”

Saeloun… That was far to the south of Baengnyeong, almost two hundred kilometers away. He would never be able to get home on his own...

“I won’t run..” Jeongguk said, “but if you think I’m going to act like a slave-”

Minwoo pushed to his feet and walked away, leaving Jeongguk sitting by the fire as the door banged shut behind him.

 

\-----☽✮☾-----

 

Jeongguk didn’t sleep for fear of the door opening again. The burn under his collar seemed like a living thing, the pulse and sting of it eating at his sanity every time he so much as twitched. Just when he thought he could stand it no more the tell-tale sound of boots on snow brought him to his feet. He stood to face Minwoo as he opened the door. Light spilled in and the snow outside was still falling softly; some of it clung to his hair.

He closed the door behind him and stood there staring at Jeongguk for a long minute.

“I need you to promise me that bring you into our home for the winter won’t be a danger to my family. I need you to promise me, before I take you there, that you’ll follow the laws of this village. You won’t resist our ways or try to fight. You will do what you’re told when you’re told. You won’t speak to anyone but me or my family unless they speak to you first. If anyone tries to harm you, you come to me, you don’t try to defend yourself; not unless your life is in danger. Do you understand? If you cannot do this, I will take you back to the market right now.”

Jeongguk swallowed the bitter lump in his throat and forced himself to nod.

“I need you to say it. Promise me.”

“I understand.” Jeongguk whispered, “I’ll do what I’m told. I won’t talk to anyone without your permission… I promise.”

“Good. Put these on and come with me.” He dropped Jeongguk’s boots to the floor in front of him and Jeongguk hurried to shove his feet inside, leaving the laces undone as he hurried to follow the alpha from the barn. Jeongguk trudged through the snow, trying to step in the same places as Minwoo. He shivered as an icy wind blew through his thin robes, wishing he had his own clothes back. He didn’t know where they went after Seulgi took them away. At least his boots had been saved.

The sun had risen fully in the sky by now. Minwoo lead him over the crest of a hill and down a thin winding road through the trees until eventually a small cabin came into view near the edge of the woods. Behind the house a thick pine forest spread down the mountain side as far as the eye could see. Smoke curled from the chimney and chickens clucked from a hutch tucked against the side of the house. A plastic rain barrel and a gas tank were the only things that spoke of any kind of advanced civilization, but the gas tank looked old and rusted; it was obvious that it hadn’t seen propane in years.

Minwoo lead him to the door. He followed the alpha’s example and toed his boots off on the porch. He looked back over his shoulder one more time at the trees, there was nothing stopping him from walking straight into the snow-covered branches and disappearing before Minwoo realized what had happened. He knew how to cover his tracks. But then he thought again, about what Minwoo had said about his family...He stepped through the door slowly, unsure of what to expect. His hand instinctively reached for the knife on his hip that hadn’t been there in days…

He looked around the room and almost jumped in surprise as he caught sight of a figure so striking they took his breath away.

Before him was a woman of short stature but with an energy about her that made her seem as tall as any man, with skin the color of sunbeams and a mane of raven black hair. Her eyes were strong, unnervingly so. A beautiful earthy brown, like soil fertile enough to nurture a whole village and she had painted them with charcoal to make her appearance even more powerful. She was by far the most beautiful woman Jeongguk had ever seen.

But her eyes, as striking as they were, did not seem to hold any potential for kindness like Seulgi's had. Those eyes pierced Jeongguk with a look so cold it paralyzed him. The woman's elegant lips looked as though any attempt at a smile might break them.

But her actions were so contrary to her appearance that it was momentarily jarring. She stood at the table in the middle of the main room with her hands pressed into a ball of dough on a kneading board. She wiped the flour from her hands onto the sooty apron she wore wrapped over a red woolen skirt. Upon closer inspection her dark hair was grayed near her hairline and the mass of it was held back from her face by a thick band of leather wrapped around her head. He could tell immediately by her scent that this woman was a beta.

Then she spoke.

“So you’re the omega, then?” Her gaze dropped down, inspecting the arm Jeongguk noticed he was holding close to middle chest instinctively. Her lips pressed together disapprovingly. “What happened there?

“I shot him.” Minwoo said, from where he was hanging up his furs near the back door.

“And then you bought him?” She asked, incredulously.

Minwoo shrugged, still not bothering to look over at them.

She sighed, “I’m Bada.” The woman tilted her head to the side, thinking. “I should take a look at your arm. Are you hungry?”

Jeongguk shook his head in answer, looking away from her,

She pulled a spoon from her apron pocket and turned to a pot on the stove. “Minwoo, come here and stir while I take a look at the omega’s arm.”

Minwoo sighed and mumbled something about Yoona doing a fine job patching him up, but he took his place at the stove obediently.

Bada set a bowl down on the table and prepared a bundle of herbs, soaking them the way his mother always had when he’d managed to catch a cut during training that required something a bit more than spit and grit to get over. He couldn’t help pressing back against the wall when she moved towards him, however. This woman wasn’t his mother.

She stopped, eyeing him for a moment. “I only want to clean it for you.” She said, matter-of-fact.

Of course she did. She wanted Jeongguk’s arm to heal, obviously, or else he wouldn’t be of any use to them. Slowly, he moved towards the table, taking a swift look around his surroundings.

The house looked old. Lived in. Probably at least a couple of generations, but from what he could see it was only Minwoo and Bada who lived there. He could smell no one else. Through an open door he could see a storeroom. Inside he could see barrels stacked two high and vegetables strung up on hooks. In the corner of the living area a large trunk sat. All of it served to drive home the fact that even though Minwoo had said his ‘family’, Jeongguk saw no signs of a pack here. None of the trappings of a pup or any personal items that indicated another wolf might show up at any moment.

Bada unwrapped his arm as Jeongguk sat down slowly, holding it firmly in place until it was free. Jeongguk gripped the edge of the table in pain with his good hand as she slowly lowered it and set his hand in his lap. The skin covering his shoulder was a dark purple, still swollen but not as red as it had been two days ago. He tried to keep his breathing slow and easy as he blinked back the prickling tears behind his eyes. He could tell by the way she handled him that she was a healer, a real healer, not a novice like the young woman from before. Perhaps she was the girl’s mentor. Bada was focused as she gently cleaned the skin before filling the wound with something that looked like beeswax. Jeongguk lowered his face to sniff curiously at it. She leaned in at the same time to look closer at his arm and he jerked back. Her nearness made him uncomfortable.

Her fingers followed the skin up to his neck to where he could feel the burn radiating. Bada walked to the door and returned a moment later with a handful of snow that she deposited into a soft, clean piece of cloth.

“Here.” She pressed it into the burn, forcing him to lift his hand and hold it there. “Yoona didn’t tell me she tended to you. It looks good. We can cut these stitches out next week. In the meantime the wax will keep you from tearing them anymore. And by then your face will look better, too.” He winced thinking about his bruised cheek and his cut lip and how it must look a mess by now from the blow the alpha had dealt him and from his fall in the woods. She took his free hand, examining the blisters and raw skin from his time bound inside the cart. “And these, too. We can take the stitches out, but the shoulder will take longer to heal completely; on the inside..”

Jeongguk said nothing and she leaned down to meet his eyes. He wanted to reach out and take a handful of her hair into his fist. Slam her head into the table. She had been nothing but kind to him so far but he hated her. He hated them all.

“How old are you?” She asked. He stiffened, unsure of how to answer. If he lied and said he was younger then he was they would know he was lying because his scent had already developed, but if he said he was older they might have something even worse in mind for him. So he decided to tell the truth,

“Fourteen.”

“So not quite a pup anymore, but old enough to fight according to the laws of your people, I gather?” She nodded at the callouses on the palms of his hands, his token for long hours spent handling heavy axes. “Have you had your first heat?”

He balked, his eyes flickering to Minwoo and back. Is that what they wanted him for? Is that why they decided to keep him after Sooman rejected him? Why Minwoo wanted him to stay for the winter? To keep him long enough for his heat to hit and then mark him? Breed him?

Bada’s nostrils flared and she shook her head, she must have scented his panic. “I’ll take that as a yes, then. How many heats, boy? Have you lain with an alpha before?”

“No.” He spat, scandalized. “I’m too young. And we don’t have alphas in my village anyway. There are only omegas, and a few betas.”

She cocked a brow at him and he stared right back at her, jaw locked stubbornly. The silence stretched on and on and Bada showed no signs of relenting so he sighed and answered.

“I presented two months ago. If everything goes according to nature my first full heat will hit by the end of next month.” His eyes flicked to Minwoo nervously. Bada snorted.

“Don’t worry about him, boy. Our Minwoo doesn’t have any interest in scrawny omega brats. I could drop a full grown omega in the throes of heat right in front of him and he most likely wouldn’t even react. It’s good you haven’t been with anyone before. You’re right, too young for it. And your body doesn’t know what it’s missing so it won’t be crying out for something it can’t have when the time comes. The scent of your heat will be weaker, more manageable and easier to hide. We wouldn’t want any alphas sniffing around here while you’re laid out.”

Jeongguk squirmed uncomfortably, trying to make sense of the situation. Minwoo had said Jeongguk had to behave to protect his family, and he’d called Bada his mother, but she didn’t speak about him like any bearer he ever knew spoke about their son.

She helped Jeongguk slide his arm back into the sleeve of his robe, repositioning it before wrapping it securely against his side with another length of cloth bandage. “You shouldn’t be moving it so much. In a few days we’ll see about transitioning you to a sling. From now on you’ll stay here with us. Minwoo will set you up a place to sleep in the loft…” She paused for a moment, “And as I’m sure he’s already told you; I’d stay clear of anyone outside of this house if I were you.” She stood and made her way to the stove, taking another wooden bowl from the cabinet above Minwoo’s head, she took the spoon from his hand and spooning a generous serving of stew inside. She placed it in front of Jeongguk. They locked eyes again and silence reigned. Jeongguk realized that this was going to be a theme so he sighed and picked up the bowl, blowing on it gently before he took a cautious sip.

“I don’t know why Minwoo took you on, but from the looks of it I’m stuck with you until the thaw. Until then, you’ll help me out around here. You don’t have to talk, you can be as stubborn as you like; but if I’m going to feed you, you have to work for it.” She sat her hands on her hips, staring at him down her nose, “And if you bring trouble into this house, omega, I swear to Chugun, you won’t make it off this mountain.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Come see me on twitter: [@vinniekpop](https://twitter.com/vinniekpop)
> 
> CuriousCat: [@climbingvines](https://curiouscat.me/climbingvines1)


	7. the moon just stared back at me and in its light I saw my two feet on the ground

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Long time no see. Sorry for the long hiatus Hanbin's departure hit me harder than initially thought. Also, sorry the ending of the chapter seems a bit abrupt I wanted to move forward to present day Jiwon but the chapter was getting way two long so I had to cut it in half. 
> 
> \- Vinnie

_ October 19th, 2395 _

_ Wonju Compound _

  
  


Hanbin stayed away. He kept himself locked in his cabin, locked in the dark because having to face the pack hurt. He’d left it once, looking for that tiny bit of hope, that spark of light being among his packmates could sometimes bring him. But all he saw was hurt, mourning, swollen eyes and tears. It was like the world was mocking him for his ability to See and do nothing about it. Everywhere he looked he saw death, but this time he was seeing the imprint a death left behind on a community instead of seeing the shadow of it looming over someone as their time quickly came.

It was night now and he wandered the streets, lost. He even went to the clinic. He didn’t know why. Maybe he thought seeing Hyunsuk’s body would help. The funeral was scheduled for sunrise. The dig crew had been at work all night, preparing the grave. It was his last chance to see him, privately. To ask him for some sort of forgiveness. Outside the morgue, the empty clinic echoed like a tomb. Maybe that was appropriate, he thought. The quiet was sort of soothing.

He knew that tomorrow morning, once the funeral ended, he would be expected to take his rightful place as the Head Alpha. He was Hyunsuk’s heir, after all. The problem was… he didn’t want that.

He had never wanted that. He knew as an alpha he was supposed to want that. The desire to lead, protect, and provide was supposed to be in his blood. Maybe he was broken. Maybe he was cursed in more ways than one, but the idea of being in charge… of the entire pack looking to him for guidance… it made him feel sicker than any vision of death ever had. 

He’d never told Hyunsuk.

Never told him that taking over the pack one day was the last thing he ever wanted to do.

He couldn’t live with seeing death all around him. Hopeless, inevitable death. He couldn’t keep looking at the faces of his neighbors, packmates, friends, and family and seeing death in them. If he was barely coping with the guilt now, how was he supposed to cope with it as their Alpha? As Head Alpha he couldn’t keep locking himself in the dark to stop himself from Seeing. Eventually his depression and despair would turn to madness.

And he feared, actively feared, that the madness would turn him into one of those vicious creatures who had hunted the only father he remembered and murdered him right before his very eyes.

He passed through the doors of the morgue and stopped next to the casket that rested on the stainless steel table. In their Compound, the morgue functioned as medical, criminal, and funeral parlor. He reached for the lid and hesitated.

This was it. The last time he would see his alpha, his father, his leader.

Tomorrow, he will take his place.

Maybe it was better to end it. Just end it now, while the pack’s grief was still thick. The blow would be softened by the veil of death already hanging over the Compound. He could walk out into the forest and let the Rabid get him. Or he could take the knife he’d traded for and drive it into his heart. They said you had to be insane to harm yourself like that. He thought he was crazy enough, maybe. But what if he couldn’t do it?

He could walk away. Walk until his legs stopped working. Until he dropped from exhaustion, or hunger, or thirst. The Rabid would find him then for sure, unless he made it to the Walls.

He could start over on the other side of the Walls. Find a job in the city. Maybe he could find Jiyong.

Jiyong!

Damn, why didn’t he think of it before! He could find Jiyong!

Jiyong was Hyunsuk’s nephew, an alpha, who before Hanbin was adopted was next in line for pack leadership. He was older than Hanbin, more confident and sure of his abilities. He’d gone to the city over a year ago and they hadn’t heard from him in the last six months, sure, but Hanbin knew he was alive. He’d gone with some agemates to study at one of the Universities but the others had come back without him. They’d waited by the gate for three days until their travel visas that allowed them into the city had expired and they’d been forced to leave without him. Everyone had expected him to show up within a few days, but months had passed and they’d given up hope.

Most of the pack thought the young alpha was dead, but Hyunsuk had never believed it. It didn’t fit with the teachings of the Walls, who prized science and logic over all else, but Hyunsuk had always told him privately that he could  _ feel _ the members of his pack. He could tell when one of them was hurt, sick, in trouble. His connection with Jiyong was very weak, he’d told Hanbin, and he could feel some distress, some anger, but it was still there. Jiyong was still alive. And Hanbin knew he was still alive because he hadn’t seen his death. That was all the reassurance he needed.

Maybe, if Hanbin could find him, he could bring him back and Jiyong could take over as leader of the pack.

He placed his hand on the cool wooden lid of the casket, closed his eyes, and whispered a quick apology.

He left to go find Junhoe.

 

\-----☽✮☾-----

 

Junhoe about jumped out of his skin at the sound of the first pebble hitting the glass of his bedroom window. The second one had him swearing and leaving his deck to peer outside.

The moon was high in the sky and there was barely a cloud in the sky so he could see Yang Hanbin easily, standing in his backyard, arm pulled back to toss another stone. He threw the window open and swore when the rock sailed past his head instead and clattered across the wood of his floorboards. 

Hanbin laughed lowly down below as Junhoe glared at him. He drew back like he was going to throw again and Junhoe waved a hand at him, 

“Stop! I’ll be down in a second.” He didn’t know what but he stopped to pull on a pair of jeans and throw on a jacket. He was already dressed for the night but something was telling him he needed real clothes for this adventure. 

Outside, Hanbin was already waiting by his backdoor. One look at the other alpha and he knew he’d been right. He was dressed in work clothes and had a pair of sturdy boots on his feet. There was a pack over his shoulder. Junhoe frowned.

“Where are you going?”

“To the Walls.”

Junhoe’s eyes practically bugged out of his head.

“The Walls?!” he nearly shouted. Hanbin hushed him hurriedly.

“Yes. I’m going to find Jiyong.”

“Find Ji- _Bin_!” Junhoe was beyond exasperated. “Your father’s funeral is in the morning. They’re going to need you here in a few days, what are you doing?”

Hanbin shook his head. “I can’t do it, June. I can’t be Head Alpha. I- Jiyong was supposed to do it, remember? Before they found me it was him. I took that from him, it was his birthright. Besides, he deserves to know his uncle is dead. I left a letter, for Tablo, asking him to watch over things while I’m gone. People will listen to him as Head Beta. And then once we find Jiyong we’ll bring him back and he can be in charge.”

Junhoe had never heard Hanbin sound so afraid before. In the past whenever the topic of him becoming Compound Leader came up he always spoke about it with such confidence. Now, he was practically shaking. 

“You’re really going?” Junhoe asked.

“Yes.”

“Tonight?”

“Right now.”

“I’m coming with you.”

Hanbin looked relieved that he didn’t have to ask. “Thank you.”

Junhoe shook his head, turning to go back into the house and pack a bag. He hoped his sister was sound asleep. The alpha girl was nosey and protective. Worse than either of their beta parents had ever been. She would raise a stink if she caught them. And he was definitely going. There wasn’t a thing Hanbin could ever ask Junhoe to do that the younger boy would deny him. Because even though it went against everything the Committee said was right, even though it was something so crass and undesirable and forbidden, Koo Junhoe had been in love with Hanbin for as long as he could remember. He knew it was pointless, that not only was it wrong to feel that way for another alpha, Hanbin definitely didn’t feel that way for him. The other boy was oblivious. Called him his best friend, his brother, and Junhoe was willing to take what he could get. 

He would follow Hanbin anywhere. Even out into the wilderness.

Even to the Walls. 

  
  


\-----☽✮☾-----

 

**Three Years Earlier**

_ Sapaesan Sanatorium _

_ Beyond the Northern Wall _

 

 

When Jiwon was about four he went grocery shopping with his grandfather. Somehow, he got separated from him and was wandering around lost asking people where his grandfather was. 

He remembered one alpha, a scrawny, stringy, twitchy sort of man who’d said to him, 

“Your grandfather is outside, I’ll take you to him.”

So Jiwon followed him outside. The alpha told him that his grandfather was in a van, parked at the very back of the parking lot. Jiwon remembered thinking it was weird, because no one but Enforcement or Department approved delivery drivers had vans, but then the alpha had opened the door for him to get in. Next thing Jiwon had known, the guy had been thrown up against the side of the van. He looked over and there was his grandfather, strangling the guy.

Jiwon remembered the words his grandfather said to the alpha that day. He called him a sick man and said if he ever saw him around the district again he would kill him.

Jiwon remembered thinking how cool his grandfather was at the time, even though it was a little scary and he didn’t quite know what was happening. When he was older, when he thought about that day he wasn’t sure why his grandfather hadn’t reported the incident. 

Jiwon knew he scared the living daylights out of the alpha. He remembered the silver rimmed glasses that fell off when his grandfather had his hands around the man’s throat. The way the alpha was crying and saying he was sorry while Jiwon stood there, confused.

His grandfather had let the guy go, grabbed Jiwon’s hand, and then they’d walked away.

When Jiwon was seven years old he witnessed a Star-Blighted man firing shots out of his window into the street in a crowded part of their neighborhood.

It had been summertime and there had been a lot of people out and about.

He only hit one person, who fortunately survived, but the scene of mass panic with people running around and shots ringing out remained ingrained in Jiwon’s mind forever.

He had been out with a friend that day, and the friend’s sire had grabbed him and took him into a house as shots rained down around them. He didn’t know who the house had belonged to but he could still remember a bullet hitting the brick wall right behind them as the door closed.

Enforcement came and took him away. The next day everyone in the district acted like it had never happened.

When he was eight the city went through a period where there were extended power outages. The taps would run out and all the occupants of their block had to draw water from a large underground water reservoir beneath their building.

Jiwon had walked down with his neighbor's live-in omega maid. She offered him five credits if he helped her carry back water. He still didn’t know how it happened but suddenly she had toppled over and fell straight into the reservoir. The initial force pushed her back to the surface and on instinct he’d reached out and grabbed her hand, then started screaming like crazy.

He hadn’t been strong enough to pull her out and he’d felt his grip loosening with each second that passed, but he’d kept right on screaming.

Luckily, an adult had heard his shout and joined to pull her out of the water.

He still got chills thinking about the incident and the fact that she might not have survived if he hadn't been there when it happened. All for five credits.

At some point after that, his mother got sick. 

Star-Blighted, they said, just like that man taking pot shots at kids on the street. She took him away one day. They left his father and his brother behind in District 2. He remembered crying and asking his mother when they were going home, but she would never answer.

From that point on, his mother deliberately chose to live away from Enforcement-controlled areas of the city; hiding her son among criminals and Taliian refugees. The fact that they had never been tracked down told Jiwon that his father's - and by extension, his mother's - family,  didn’t care enough about the omega son to try to get him back when the beta son was safe and sound. 

He was ten when his mother completely lost her mind and someone reported her as Rabid.

When his father showed up, looking to take him away from the Enforcement station, Jiwon had agreed to go with him mostly because he didn't really care where he went. He'd figured he could take off if he didn't like it. He’d practically lived on his own, taken care of himself, for the past two years. 

He went to school during the day and he went to work with his father in the steel mills at night. It was illegal, but the foreman turned a blind eye to it because he only had to pay Jiwon a quarter of the pay for the same amount of work. He remembered walking alongside his dad, water dripping off a corrugated metal roof. 

He was twelve. His dad’s enormous hand pawed at his shirt and pulled him close. “Don’t speak unless spoken to. And don’t say anything smart.” His dad had whispered the last word like it was something foul and shameful. For his omega son to be outspoken and smart...

When he was thirteen he was identified during a routine health check as having the potential to be Touched.

There were dozens of known combinations of genetic material that might result in a Touched individual, and probably a hundred more that weren’t known. One of those combinations was encoded into his DNA, but not everyone who carried the gene developed the ability. Just the idea that he could pass it on to his children, however, was enough to have him put on the shortlist for sterilization. 

When he was fourteen he presented as an omega, just as expected, and  _ they _ began to watch him like a hawk.

When he was fourteen and three months he touched the railing leading down to a train platform and almost screamed as the memory of a woman falling took over his mind. He could feel her fear, the shock of the ground not being where she expected it, the rush of adrenaline she felt when she realized she was going to hit the ground and keep going; down, down, down she rolled until she came to rest at the bottom of the stairs. Her wrist had broken and her skin was bruised and abraded but she lived. The memory took him over so completely that he almost repeated her fall.

From that moment on his life then took a turn. 

He was taken from his family, given a room in the Sapaesan Sanatorium with other Touched children. The Sanatorium was located just beyond the northernmost Wall, high up on Dobongsan Mountain, closest to District 10. 

The math and science lessons of his old high school were supplemented with gymnastics, martial arts and weapons training. He ran obstacle courses in the thin mountain air and took all the vitamins and medications they gave him without a fuss. Anything was better than going home to a father who couldn’t stand to look at him. 

When he was sixteen his Touched ability was declared ‘essential’ and he was assigned a position within a team of agents. He was accepted into the special Enforcement program and he was told he was lucky, because for Touched children like him his only other option was a life wasting away inside the Sanatorium; many of his friends didn’t make the grade and were siphoned off into far away dormitories, given menial jobs under the strict supervision of armed guards.

The training was relentless. Jiwon would see other Agents that were nearing the end of their training and grew envious. He yearned for the day he ticked over to twenty years old and he could be fully promoted. Not once did it cross his mind that he was ultimately wishing to be closer to his own demise. By then he has already seen ‘less successful candidates’ perish in accidents. Eighteen-year-old Jiwon was no stranger to violent death. As time progressed, the ‘cadets’ as they were called learned to avoid strong connections with each other; after their friends started dying in training, it was much easier to simply keep to theirselves and stay focused.

But death by training was only one looming possibility. 

For the Touched, death by insanity was a harsh reality they might one day have to face. It wasn’t uncommon that the Touched individuals locked away inside Sanatoriums became lost inside their own minds- so lost that they forgot to eat, forgot to drink, and, in extreme cases, forgot to live. Their powers, repressed for so long, eventually consumed them. Jiwon had seen some of those who suffered a break from suppressing their abilities. They were close to mute, able to communicate only in scattered bursts of sound or, in severe cases, through diagram and gesture. The rest of the time, they remain locked in their own silent worlds.

Death was something to be feared, but Jiwon always thought that inside the Walls, the dead were the fortunate ones. Inside the Walls, using their powers meant being rounded up and put to work by the government. If they weren’t deemed useful they were locked away. If they were too dangerous they were disposed of. Government sanctioned murder. Those who were put to work, worked until their minds broke. Most broke under the pressure. Those who survived that break were no longer sentient, their minds locked inside a fractured shell. 

Inside the Walls, the Touched rarely traveled, rarely mingled, rarely functioned as a normal human being any level as their minds slowly stagnate from either suppressing their powers or overworking them. 

Yet the Committee said that it was way things were meant to be. That any deviation from normal was dangerous and contributed to the rate of the Rabid inside the Walls. Jiwon was proof enough of that; the Touched son of the Rabid mother.

For that reason, the Touched belonged to the Committee. The Committee kept close tabs on Citizens, looked for any sign that a new presented child might be manifesting strange abilities. Civilian reporting was encouraged. Rewards were handed out. Once a Touched individual was found and removed from polite society, the Committee took over every aspect of their lives. Took care of everything they couldn't; from checking their medical status to ensuring they didn't starve. The Touched weren't very good at practical things like that. As their mental states deteriorated, they began to forgot simple things like remembering to get out of bed. 

It was said that the Committee took care of Touched children out of the kindness of their hearts but Jiwon knew better. The Committee took care of Touched children because they were useful, and because children were easier to manipulate as adults when they were raised to believe in the institution they were serving. It was even rumored that the Committee had a history of producing Touched individuals on purpose by manipulating the MATCH, just to see what kind of abilities they could get to manifest, and then use for their own gain. It was theorized that in the days prior to the MATCH, one in every four births resulted in a Touched child. Now, those numbers were supposed to be much lower, but Jiwon had lived in Sanatoriums for over eight years now and there had never been an empty bed. 

Jiwon had been forgetting a lot of things lately. For example, he'd forgotten to eat three days in a row. That was when orderlies had intervened. Three days was the allowable window  - sometimes Touched went into trances. If that had been the case, they would've stayed at his side, keeping him hydrated, with a IV of nutrition wired straight into his veins. He was too valuable. His ability was useful and too many hours of training had been invested in him to just let him waste away. He hadn’t gone into a trance since they assigned him to a team, sent him out most days and allowed him to use his abilities. For that, at least, he was grateful. 

Even with the daily exercise they told him he would be facing certain madness in ten or twenty years if he was lucky, sentenced to spend the next couple of decades after locked in the hell of his own fragmented mind…

 

\-----☽✮☾-----

 

**Three Years Earlier**

_ The City of Seoul; The Walls _

_ 25th Western District; Gangseo-gu _

  
  


To the denizens of Seoul, District 25 was known simply as ‘The Slums’. It supported the main building facilities inside the Walls; the factories that created the materials needed to build the towering skyscrapers and maintain the subways. Jiwon’s father had worked in one of the steel mills after his mother had been taken away. Jiwon remember the smoke, the acrid stench of the air that was almost too heavy to breath. The neighborhood that sprung up around the factories were more along the lines of shanty towns.

Out here, Enforcement presence was few and far between. Because of that, the dregs of society had long since claimed the streets of District 25 as their own. The civilian police refused to patrol there, and the Committee rarely bothered sending in their Agents. The criminal underworld usually handed out its own swift and unforgiving justice.

Underworld culture was rife within the Slums. Red neon signs from bars and brothels provided the streetlight; the original streetlights having long since failed. Abandoned buildings were bastardised to repair those left standing, turning the urban landscape into a patchwork quilt of corrugated iron and thin plywood. The once busy shipping cranes now loomed over the skyline, slowly rusting away, their frames casting angular shadows across the streets. Steam wafted from street grates; stormwater leaking into the sewage systems before finally escaping into the atmosphere in heavy, putrid clouds. The street was filled with a discordant noise from the combined music from the various seedy nightclubs and bars.

Jiwon looked up, and saw the building Yunhyeong had described. It was to be his new base, his home away from home on the assignment he’d been given just that morning. The majority of the windows were smashed, and those that weren’t were caked in filth. The door had been kicked in; either by a vandal or some velorum junkie that had forgotten his keys. Free newspapers and junk mail from months past littered the floor, a combination of refuse from the apartments and debris blown in from the street. The paneling was falling off the walls, and the paint was peeling back. A wooden stairway led up to the second floor. The stairs groaned ominously under Jiwon’s tread as he ascended. The building was well on the way to collapsing under its own weight. Somehow, the door to Jiwon’s allotted apartment was intact. Either the locals didn’t think that there was anything worth stealing in an abandoned apartment, or they already knew that it was an Enforcement safe house and wanted to avoid trouble. When he unlocked the door, the room only contained a basic cot, a kitchenette, and a small bathroom.

Without warning, his comms unit crackled to life.

“What a dump...” Yunhyeong’s face blinked at him from the video feed. “Not like that’s a first. Anyway, guess what? They’ve got a job for us today!” 

Yunhyeong’s ability to be so chipper in the morning never ceased to irritate him.

“I figured as much. They sent me the dossier at the crack of dawn and had me on a train before I was even fully awake.” He set the clunky comms unit on the counter and began to rummage through one of the cabinets. “So while I’m sure you’re absolutely aching to get out in the field, first, I’m having a cup of tea.”

“No time for that, sweetheart.” Jiwon gritted his teeth. It didn’t matter that he was male, or that he knew over a dozen ways to kill a person depending on the situation, the fact that he was an omega was always going to be his primary designation in people’s minds. Sweetheart, Honey, Darling. He knew Yunhyeong well enough to know that he wasn’t trying to be a dick about it, but it didn’t mean that it didn’t still ruffle his feathers a bit. 

“It’s go-time now and we can’t afford to wait.” Yunhyeong was speaking again. “The spooks have dug up a resistance cell nearby and they need us to raid it before they move in for a closer look. These guys rarely stay in one place for more than a day or two, so if we blink, we’ll miss them.”

Jiwon put the teapot he’d rustled up down on the sink. “Can’t I at least get dressed first? I don’t think my civilians have the ammo-carrying capacity I’ll need for a raid…”

“Fine, do what you want. But be quick about it. We need to be at the staging point as soon as possible…”

 

\-----☽✮☾-----

 

“That’s the place there,” Yunhyeong notified Jiwon as they maneuvered from one rooftop to the next. It was an abandoned factory yard, probably as old as the Walls themselves. Not a single window was left unbroken, and the smokestacks that had once jutted from the pitched roof had disintegrated to the point where they barely rose above the roofline. Rusted shipping containers and toppled scaffolding littered the surrounding area. It was like it was built specifically for staging an ambush. Likewise, that also meant that there was a lot of cover for their approach, which meant that Jiwon and Yunhyeong could close in on the enemy and engage them on their terms.

“Intel estimated about ten personnel, heavily armed.” Yunhyeong whispered. “They’ll probably have some decent detection gear, so once we pass the line of departure, you can be sure they’ll know we’re coming. And therein lies the problem. As soon as they get wind of a raid, they’ll start scrapping documents. Our mission is to seize the documents before they get destroyed. Everything else is secondary to whatever papers they are holding. Oh yeah, and to make everything just that little bit easier, we’ve got no additional intel on this area, and we’ve detected some signal jamming, so once we begin the assault it looks like we’re on our own. We can’t call in any reinforcements.” Yunhyeong said drolly, reading off the mission dossier.

“You almost sound like you enjoy delivering bad news…” Jiwon rolled his eyes.

“Misery loves company…”

“Just shut up and move, already.”

“Roger. Catch you on the other side. Out.” Yunhyeong gave him a brisk salute, gun held at the ready across his body as he moved at a crouch around the far corner. Jiwon moved in the opposite direction. The technology in his fatigues would help him avoid the enemy’s thermal scanners, but they would still have to keep an eye out for motion sensors and trip-wires. It wasn’t going to be easy. He often wondered how the rebellion afforded things like the sort of proximity detection devices they often deployed. The obvious answer was that they stole them, but there were rumors that someone was helping them. Funneling them money or buying them equipment. 

He drew his pistol and combat blade, and then crept forward.

Assuming that he could remain undetected until he got to the factory, his preferred method of attack would be to enter through the roof while Yunhyeong entered from the ground. Together they would cut a swathe through the defenders, and seizing the files. Quick and precise.

Jiwon proceeded in a slow, stealthy advance. Here, he rounded a rusted fuel tank, and there, he pulled himself atop a shipping container. He needed to get up, and keep moving up to reach the roof. There were no sentries, scanners or traps to be seen. Doubt began to creep into his mind. What if the intel was wrong? What if this was the wrong factory? What if the rebels had moved on already? What if this was just a trap, and each step was taking them deeper into the maw of the enemy?

But the Intelligence Department was rarely wrong, and even less likely to call a raid without a solid reason for doing so. For starters, someone would have to justify the expenses to the Committee, and no one wanted to be a part of that process.

A split second before he started to move again, Jiwon heard a noise. It was only the slightest of footsteps, but it was enough to cause every muscle in his body to tense up with anticipation. His muscles twitched and ached, begging for action, as he carefully began to crawl towards the source of the sound.

Without warning, the rusted roof of the shipping container gave way, collapsing under his body weight, plunging Jiwon down into the pile of detritus that had accumulated in the container. The rusted sheets of metal that had seconds ago made up the roof of the container, fell down onto Jiwon, pinning his legs amongst the rubble. It took all his self-control to prevent himself from shouting in surprise from both the fall and the sudden pain. He took a moment to take stock; from what he could tell, the fall had only caused some superficial bruising, maybe a few small scrapes– nothing he couldn’t cope with.

The footsteps that a moment ago were a faint whisper, were now the hurried, clanking pound of an armed man running. Jiwon heard a voice bark through a radio;

“What the hell was that? Paik, go check it out…”

“Looks like another one of these containers fucking collapsed.” A voice responded, just outside the door. “Nothing unusual there. God this place is a shit heap.”

“Check it out anyway. We’re almost done here, and I don’t want any screw ups.”

“Fine. Fine…” Jiwon faintly heard the man mutter “Fuckin’ asshole”.

The rusted metal squealed as the guard forced the doors of the container open, and a sliver of light visible to Jiwon’s right. He twisted as far onto his side as the debris would allow, and took aim. The crack in the door was only a few inches wide when the protesting metal fell silent. Jiwon trained his pistol at the gap.

Outside, the guard grunted and heaved on the door to no avail. The door had reached its limit.

There was a sigh, and the guard peered through the crack. Jiwon fingered the trigger, anticipating the coming shot. The guard squinted, and put his hand to his brow in order to improve his view of the gloom. The radio barked into life again.

“Paik, report!”

“Man, I can’t see shit in there. Looks like the thing just fell in on itself.”

“You’d better be sure. I’ll kick your ass myself if you’re wrong.”

The face in the crack faded back into the glaring sunlight. Jiwon released the pressure on the trigger, and let a silent sigh loose. He holstered the pistol and waited until he could no longer hear the guard’s footsteps, then carefully worked his legs free. Since the door was obviously jammed, his only recourse was the hole in the roof. Moving gently, as not to disturb the rubble, Jiwon slowly pulled himself through the twisted mess of metal. The morning sun was blinding in comparison to the gloom of the container, and for a second Jiwon squinted in pain. It turned out to be a second too long. As the brilliant white daylight gave way to the factory ground’s scrap yard, a figure resolved itself.

Paik, the guard, was standing no more than ten meters away, cigarette in hand, frozen.

Staring directly at Jiwon.

His mouth slowly opened, yet his body didn’t move. Jiwon stared back, immobilised by shock. In his mind, he was running through his next move a thousand times over. The easiest way to dispose of this problem would be a single shot- at this range he was sure to silence the man. But a gunshot would alert his comrades, and force Jiwon to take cover. Since he was still at least fifty metres from the factory, this option didn’t look too attractive.

Alternatively, he could draw his blade, and try to cover the distance between them before Paik could fire a shot, or radio his team. However, if it worked, Jiwon would still maintain his stealth.

At that instant, the cigarette fell from Paik’s mouth, tumbling towards the ground. The decision was made. Jiwon leapt from the container, drawing his blade from over his shoulder and rolling forward in one fluid motion as he landed.

Jiwon shot out of the roll, blade pointed straight to the side as he brought the pommel down on Paik’s temple, knocking him unconscious in one quick blow. The cigarette was still coming to a rest by his feet.

It was then that Jiwon noticed the passive radio was receiving a signal. He looked at Paik’s fist, where his hand was still wrapped firmly around his radio’s ‘transmit’ button. It didn’t take long for the others to react.

“Paik? Paik? Respond! Damn it, Paik’s not responding. Everyone, defensive positions!”

The warehouse that housed the main target was barely one hundred meters away, and his primary focus was still to prevent the destruction of intelligence; something that would already be well underway now that their presence was known.

A shot ricocheted above Jiwon’s head, burying itself in the side of a container behind him.

“He’s over here! I’ve got him pinned!” the man’s hoarse voice echoed around the scrap. Muffled footsteps were closing in on Jiwon. He wondered where Yunhyeong was, whether or not he was taking advantage of the distraction to make it into the factory. Without another moment’s hesitation Jiwon triggered one of the smoke grenades attached to his belt. Before the thick white smoke could fill his vision, he darted out of his hiding place. Another shot rang out behind him, but he knew that he was too quick off the mark for the sniper. As he rolled behind his next hiding spot a man carrying a small rifle ran around the corner, almost colliding with Jiwon.

Before the man had even realised his mistake Jiwon had buried his fist into the side of his head. The blow lifted the man off his feet and threw him backwards onto the ground. Jiwon kicked the man’s gun from his hands and left him gasping. Under the cover of the billowing smoke Jiwon sprinted for the warehouse. Speed was now his friend; the enemy would be drawn to the direction of the unconscious Paik, and he could use the confusion to get around them.

He surprised a man lying in ambush, quickly dispatching him with a quick kick to the gut as he rolled to aim his rifle. The man’s grunt gave away his position, and almost instantly he heard the crack-bang of a rifle shot overhead.

Keep moving, stay alive.

He’d whispered that mantra to himself countless times over in training and out in the unforgiving terrain beyond the northern side of the Walls. He hoped the words wouldn’t fail him now. As he rounded the next corner, Jiwon saw a grime-streaked window at ground level– an entrance to the warehouse. Whatever these rebels were protecting was in there. He hoped that Yunhyeong had realized he was pinned down on the ground and had headed for the roof.

Without breaking his pace, he fired two rounds into the window and dove, blade drawn, through the shards of glass. He rolled to a stop inside the warehouse, surprising two men covering a staircase leading up to a small office. One was easily dispatched with a quick slash to the neck and Jiwon cringed. He hated shedding blood if he could avoid it. However, the other ducked behind abandoned shelving and returned fire.

His legs had already propelled him in the direction of an upturned desk. It wouldn’t provide much cover, but it was at least enough to hide him for a moment. The rebel ceased fire momentarily.

“He’s in here! I need help! He’s killed Yookun!” The desk then shuddered and splintered as the fire recommenced, slugs flying over Jiwon’s prone figure. He rolled onto his back, and lobbed a flash grenade over the desk.

He sprung up from behind the desk the moment the grenade’s flare subsided, taking long, sidewards steps towards his floundering assailant. He cleared the shelving, fired two reluctant shots into the incapacitated man and kept moving towards the warehouse’s upstairs office.

The wide glass windows had long since been smashed by vandals, the wooden panelling around it showed signs of rot and weather damage. The dilapidated wooden door gave way with a deft kick, and Jiwon darted inside, pistol drawn, sword cocked.

He took a moment to survey the small office. Papers were strewn around a small, military cot. Most of them were hand-written, and the shredder was already overflowing with mulched documents.

A young girl, no more than thirteen, sat paralysed in fear, her white-knuckled hands clutching a sheaf of paper, trembling, above the waiting maw of a shredder. A pistol lay on the desk, next to her. Her terrified eyes darted between Jiwon and the pistol, her breathing shallow and fast through thin, pursed lips. 

No training had prepared Jiwon for this. He was mentally prepared, however reluctantly, to kill any enemy; but he would never be prepared to face a child.

Most of his reactions in battle were muscle memory, but those reactions had been honed on shooting ranges with adult-sized targets, and out in the Badlands facing armed men and women. Until now, Jiwon had thought of the rebellion as a totally adults-only affair. Still dumbstruck by the sight of the child, Jiwon stood frozen.

There was a clatter behind him and Yunhyeong appeared in the doorway over his shoulder. He too pulled up short at the sight of the young girl, all the color draining from his face.

The girl quivered, her long hair falling in front of her face, slightly obscuring her bloodshot eyes, stained with tears of grief and fear. Sweat formed in beads on her brow. She glanced once more at the pistol, swallowed her fear, and made a desperate lunge for the weapon. Jiwon instinctively brought the butt of his own pistol down against the girl’s temple, concussing her into silence.

The girl’s limp body fell to the floor, her eyes rolling back into her head. Yunhyeong quickly checked outside the door, but could not yet see any aggressors moving to intercept them. The girl lay upon the documents, blood trickling from the wound on her head, but she was clearly alive.

Holstering his pistol, Jiwon inspected the young girl. She hadn’t yet presented, noting her clean baby smell, something like cotton and sunshine. He wondered what her life was like, how she’d ended up here. She hadn’t been indoctrinated by a Sergeant Major screaming orders at her since the day she’d been taken from her home, not like him. And yet, she still felt ready to fight-and die– for what she believed in.

Until now, Jiwon had thought of the rebels as deluded fools, but seeing the young girl confused him. For the first time, he saw his enemies not as faceless troublemakers, but as…. humans. He knew without a shadow of a doubt that it wasn’t in the best interests of the city to kill or torture a young girl. Which is exactly what would happen if they handed her over to Enforcement. Besides; their orders had been clear: secure the papers at any cost. As far as Jiwon could tell, the other rebels had vanished. If the Intelligence Department didn’t care if the rebels died or got away, surely they wouldn’t notice one more escapee.

Against his training, he stuffed some of the papers into his pack and began to apply a field dressing to the girl’s head. In her fist she still clutched a sheet of paper and almost on impulse he prised the paper from her grip and tucked it into the thigh pocket of his fatigues.

Jiwon stooped to lift the girl into his arms.

“What are you doing?” Yunhyeong hissed, but he didn’t try to stop him. Jiwon carried her and the pack of papers out of the office and down the stairs, then he carried her to the edge of the shipping yard. Yunhyeong followed, gun at the ready and on the alert for snipers, but the yard was deserted.

Jiwon carried the girl to the shipping container that he had fallen into. He was able to pry open the container’s door and place the unconcious girl inside. He hoped that this would at least hide her from the Intel department if and when they searched the area. What could a teenager know about the rebellion that the almighty Intelligence Department didn’t already know? In the Sanatorium, he had always been taught to take the initiative that the situation required, and so that was what he was doing, he told himself. 

Jiwon resolved himself to give this girl the chance at a normal life; one free of violence and orders, and pushed the container’s door shut.

 

\-----☽✮☾-----

 

Solitude was exactly what Yunhyeong was seeking when he quietly ordered a beer and tucked himself into the darkest available corner of the bar. His afternoon had been one of meticulous paperwork and after-action debriefings with Intel. When he had been left to patrol the streets as a regular member of the civilian police, he had no such scrutiny–life working alongside an Agent was different, it seemed. He’d been working with Jiwon for close to six months now and nothing he’d faced up until this point had been so terrifying.

Pressure had been mounting inside of him all day, and he needed a release. Every word that he uttered to the stiff face Intel agent was done so with bated breath. He knew that one misplaced phrase could reveal Jiwon’s actions with the girl and the papers that they had hidden. In the depths of his heart, he knew that what Jiwon had done was morally right. But the more he thought about it the more he cursed himself. He’d signed up for this position, signed up to work with Enforcement and actually make something of himself. 

The training had been hard. He’d learned to fire a gun, learned to wield a blade, learned to climb buildings and skulk across rooftops, and everything else that made him think- he was crazy! He was a mated man. The son of a seamstress. He came from a good family, had two beautiful children, had plenty of wealth. Why did he feel like something was missing? Daisy hated it. She cried every night for the first few weeks after she found out his partner was Touched. He’d been a bit terrified, too, at first, but Jiwon was just a normal guy. A normal guy who’d been trained to kill since he was a teenager and could pick up on moments of intense emotional memory just by touching an item. A normal guy who sometimes seemed to have no self-preservation instinct and some kind of internalized hatred for everything Enforcement and the Special Agents Project stood for. 

An enemy was an enemy, no matter their appearance. That’s what they taught them, when they learned more about the rebellion. Hesitation would get you killed on the battlefield. He had a family to think about. A mate and two kids. What would they do if Yunhyeong let Jiwon’s recklessness get him killed?

Yunhyeong emptied the glass and ordered another, stronger beer. The alcohol dulled the battle between his head and his heart, and finally from his jacket pocket he pulled a few crumpled, unread sheets of yellowing paper that he had taken from the pile he’d shoved into his own pack just moments before following Jiwon and the girl from the office. 

Maybe he was just a bit reckless, too.

Swilling the beer, Yunhyeong began to read. Making out the scrawl was made even more impossible by the poor lighting, but he struggled through.

‘We were not meant to stay here. We should have left here generations ago. The Committee has forgotten the Original Plan–maybe they have done so deliberately–but certainly they have forgotten. The Committee, lacking guidance, has kept us locked in stasis for too long. But if we can cross the Walls, all of us in mass-‘

And that was it. The scrawl cut off sharply, as if the hand writing it had jerked away. It was probably at that point that Jiwon had dispatched Paik the Rebel, sounding the alarm. And yet those men fought to keep them from getting this scrap.

The girl, obviously unable to fight, still reached for her pistol in order to protect this scrap. Yunhyeong could barely believe that she had fought for such a small fragment of thought– and less that people had chosen to give their lives to keep them from it.

In his training for the civilian police he had learned about the territory beyond the Walls. He himself had never stepped foot outside the Walls, but he knew others who had. All of them told the same story. It was beautiful out there. Wild and untamed in between the compounds; filled with ruins and rubble. But it was deadly, dangerous, and difficult. Drones constantly monitored the land between the Walled Cities, and at one point he had been forced to sit and watch countless hours of footage to familiarise himself with the appearance of the Shameless, Taliians, and to observe those Touched who lived outside the Walls and used their abilities freely. The drones had a range of several hundred kilometres and often traveled to the North, returning with footage of the nuclear wasteland that used to be Pyongyang, known as the Glow Zone, and in that footage he had never seen anything more significant than a few tribes of nomadic people, traveling through the toxic areas using second hand gear that they’d probably bought illegally to limit their exposure to radiation. Beyond that was nothing but a mountain range and beyond that was a frozen tundra that would be inconceivable for a normal human to travel through on foot.

Let alone the fact that anyone caught outside near the base of the Walls was killed on sight by one of the newly-graduated Enforcement doing their first few months of patrolling atop the expansive structure, hungry to use their training on someone. Yunhyeong had heard stories from Enforcers, about how they had killed untold numbers of defectors, all armed and equipped, attempting to flee the city. 

If you didn’t approach the gates directly, you didn’t live. If you tried to leave without the proper paperwork, you faced jail time. If you tried to climb the Walls, you died. Maybe it seemed harsh, but it was the only way to keep the Citizens of the Walls safe, contain disease, control the flow of information from dangerous fringe groups like the Shameless and the Taliians. 

The idea that people wanted to leave the Walls had always struck him as… ludicrous. But here he sat with undeniable proof that some people, the  _ rebellion _ , legitimately believed that Citizens were supposed to leave the Walls, were meant to leave the Walls, and that the Committee was wrongfully detaining them. 

And Yunhyeong?

Yunhyeong didn’t know what to think.

 

\-----☽✮☾-----

 

In District 25, in another bar on the other side of the city, Jiwon was making his own discoveries. 

He was fairly certain that the group of six or seven men who had just walked in were the remainder of the rebels Yunhyeong and himself had fought that morning, but he wasn’t about to risk a firefight to prove it. 

The bar was located two blocks away from Jiwon’s safehouse apartment. He’d chosen it because it was small. A tiny hole in the wall located down a crumbling set of steps in the basement of another deteriorating apartment building. He imagined Pre-Desolation it had been a trendy coffee spot or maybe one of those places that people went for tiny pastries and to hear poetry read allowed. Now, it was filled with an odd assortment of mismatched chairs and a scared wooden counter. The walls were covered in streaks for leaking moisture, spots of black mold accenting the peeling wallpaper. 

There was an obvious lack of radio reception in the bar, and the rebels were using it to their advantage. Or, perhaps, they were the cause of it. 

A dilemma now faced him. 

As a member of Enforcement, he should investigate the bar to determine if the lack of signal was deliberate or simply a fluke of the geography. Or, he could do nothing, and leave this as a sanctuary for himself, where no one could contact him. If he did that, and was found out, then he could only imagine two scenarios. In one, he was deemed incompetent for not identifying this illegal activity, and thereby returned to the Sanatorium until he was reassigned to manual labor. On the other hand, he could be branded a traitor for not reporting the discovery immediately. He wasn’t sure what the punishment for failing to report a rebel gathering point was, but he could imagine that it would make a lifetime of hard labor seem like the better option.

Jiwon had never had a high opinion of the government, but lately an abyss had opened in his chest, and it was rapidly filling with doubt that there was anything good about it. Perhaps it was this doubt that caused him to spare the girl and steal the papers. He couldn’t really justify that to himself, let alone to a court martial.

He paid for his drink by tapping his card to the reader built into the counter and left the bar, leaving both its mysterious lack of signal and the rebel cell it housed behind. 

As he approached the safehouse, the first thing he noticed was a tall, thin man leaning against one of the last few remaining streetlights. Jiwon slowed as he approached him, his hand floating down to rest on the handle of his gun. He made to walk straight past him when the man suddenly looked up and made eye contact with him. He jerked his head over his shoulder and started walking. Curious, Jiwon paused for just a moment, looking back and forth between his front door and the man’s retreating back. He shrugged. Maybe he was a creep and all he saw was an omega walking alone at night. If he thought Jiwon would be an easy mark he’d learn his lesson the hard way and there’s be one less creep on the streets. 

He followed at a safe distance, one hand on his gun. The man seemed to be leading him towards the train station and Jiwon thought maybe he’d misunderstood and this was just some random guy he was thoroughly freaking out by following him for three blocks, when suddenly they turned a corner and a slick black SUV came into view. Jiwon paused. The only people who had cars like that were Committee members and people high up in the government. 

The man walked right up to the car and opened the back door. He held it open, looking pointedly at Jiwon as he approached him. Jiwon hesitated,

“Kim Jiwon?”

A voice came from the backseat. Jiwon raised and eyebrow.

“Yeah?”

“Agent, I’m with the Intelligence Department. It’s been requested that you come with me to headquarters.”

Jiwon stepped closer to the car, keeping a close eye on the tall man holding open the door. Inside the car sat a woman. She was pretty unremarkable. A beta with a simple smell something like clipped grass. Her hair was in a neat bun and she wore a smart pantsuit. She held an electronic tablet of some sort in her hands that she was reading off of as she spoke. 

She seemed harmless enough. 

“Clearance?” He asked.

“Oh, right. Passcode - Remembrance.”

Jiwon nodded, sliding into the backseat next to her. The tall man shut the door and climbed into the driver’s seat.

No one said much on the drive to the City Center. Pre-Desolation the drive would have taken them an hour or more with traffic. Now, the roads were empty. During the day they would be filled with pedestrians, but at night the whole city was under a strict curfew save those who were needed at jobs that required constant employee presence, so other than the occasional Enforcement vehicle, they saw no one. 

Two towers stood, taller than any other structures inside the walls. The Service Center, and directly across from it on the other side of the central square, the Enforcement Plaza. 

The car stopped right out front of the Enforcement Plaza  and the woman, who never bothered to introduce herself, hopped out. Jiwon followed her, inside and past security, and into an elevator that barely made a sound as it whisked them up seventeen floors. 

The woman took a seat behind a desk situated next to a set of door and began to type away. After a few moments of him standing there feeling awkward she looked up at him and raised an eyebrow. 

“Well go on. He’s waiting for you.”

Jiwon huffed in annoyance. All he wanted to do was go back to the safehouse and fall asleep on the lumpy, dusty old mattress. Instead he pushed open one of the doors and stepped inside.

The office wasn’t at all what he was expecting. He was expecting opulence but what he got was staunch minimalism. A single desk and a set of chairs in front of it. A tall filing cabinet and a large, wide window with a view of the square. There were no paintings, no photos, no personal effects of any kind. Just maps and charts. 

A large man stood behind the desk looking out the window. He wasn’t overweight, he was just… huge. Muscled. He screamed alpha, even without the overwhelming scent rolling off of him; something like the oil they used to grease the gears if the machinery back at the steel mills. 

Jiwon closed the door behind him and the man turned. He immediately recognized him as General Ahn, one of the highest ranking leaders in the entirety of the Enforcement system. 

“Agent Kim,” He greeted Jiwon. Jiwon returned the greeting with a deep bow. “I’m glad you could join me.”

“Glad to be invited.” Jiwon returned, even though invited was sort of a loose term. 

“Take a seat, Agent Kim. I have something I think you’ll find very… interesting to show you.”

Slowly, Jiwon sat in one of the utilitarian chairs in front of the desk. General Ahn handed him an electronic tablet similar to the one the woman had held in the SUV and pressed ‘play’. 

On screen, a drone footage of himself carrying the unconscious body of the girl to the shipping container with Yunhyeong following close behind played on a loop. He sat, watching it play over and over again, afraid to look up. He’d never been more terrified in his life. Not when the man had fire shot into the street when he was a kid, not when he’d held onto the omega maid and helped her keep her head above water until help came, not even when they came and took him away to the Sanatorium. 

He was going to die.

“Tell me, Agent Kim, what you’re doing in that video.”

He thought about it. Thought about lying, but he couldn’t think of a reasonable excuse.

“She was just a kid.” He looked up at General Ahn as he spoke. “Just a little girl. Didn’t even have her scent yet.”

“I see.” General Ahn sighed. Jiwon blinked. Ahn reached for the electronic tablet and swiped. A picture appeared on the screen. He’d recognize him anywhere, the boy in the picture. He’d seen him on television, when the Sanatorium turned on the big screens in the rec room every night so they could watch the news. He’d seen him in parades, standing next to his father, walking to University. He was Kim Jinhwan, son of Kim Jinsun, Head of the Committee, the so called Prince of the Walls. 

“Do you recognize this man?”

“Yes.”

“And what about him? Would you say he’s just a child?”

“No. Committee Member Jinsun’s son is a full year older than myself, if I’m remember correctly.”

“But he appears innocent enough, does he not?”

“Kim Jinhwan-ssi is a model citizen.”

“Kim Jinhwan,” General Ahn said, “Is the leader of the rebellion.”

Jiwon’s jaw dropped. 

“Impossible.”

Ahn sighed again, “I’m afraid it’s so. This is top secret information, by the way, Agent Kim. Not even the Committee Member Jinsun knows about his son’s… extracurriculars. You must know this information doesn’t come without a price. 

“What do you want from me?”

General Ahn looked at him with something not unlike the knowing smile of a father teaching his child.

“Do you know why the old Socialists before the Desolation failed every time they tried to set up their perfect societies? Mostly because they became paranoid and lost control. But within these Walls, we can control everything–including our enemies.” General Ahn looked at him with cold eyes. 

“What does that have to do with me?”

“Without an enemy to fight, most societies end up tearing themselves apart from the inside, especially when there is no obvious benefit in a peaceful existence. When you have no enemies, even your friends start to look suspicious. And once you start down that path, there is no turning back. Executions are followed by lynching, which are followed by death squads motivated by fear of being killed themselves. It is only when an external power intervenes that the cycle is broken. But we don’t have that luxury–we are here on our own, stranded in this wasteland. So we needed another option. We all have a part to play, here in our great city? And the rebellion plays a simple role– to act as a pressure valve for the City. ”

“I don’t understand. Are you saying the rebellion… are you saying you  _ let _ the rebellion exist? You want them to be out there, sowing discontent? You’re saying the public needed someone to hate to distract them, so you created an enemy?” asked Jiwon, incredulously.

“I prefer to say manipulated. The spirit of rebellion is so deeply ingrained in the human psyche that it was bound to happen. But this way we are in control. It is another mistake of the societies of old–they let rebellion fester in the cafés and alley bars until it toppled the central power. Now it is simply another business unit for us to manage.” General Ahn moved towards Jiwon’s chair and placed his hand on the omega’s forearm. “And that is what I need you for. I need you to kill Kim Jinhwan and lead the Rebellion for me. To steer it so that the destruction that it wreaks is creative in its nature. To feed us with enough wins to keep the public opinion with us, but to stay at a low enough level that the news media would still prefer to focus on the latest celebrity mishap than an ongoing investigation. We cannot allow Kim Jinhwan to continue leading because the people love him. If they find out he’s in charge they might actually start listening to what the rebels are saying. I need you to do this for me– I can’t be seen to have any connection to it. If the Committee knew then the whole system would collapse.”

“Something tells me that you are not joking,” Jiwon growled. Images of the Rebels that he’d seen killed flashed before his eyes. Each one of them had been mostly innocent; those that had climbed the Walls had been bothering no one, they merely wanted to escape, chasing the idea of a new life. And those inside the Walls had seemed to have had no sin beyond trying to protect each other from the horrors brought on by life inside the Walls. At least when he was fighting for the Committee... he thought he had the population’s best interests in mind.

“Why would I joke about this? For you, the choice is clear. Either take the assignment; with you and your partner, Song Yunhyeong, reporting directly to me– off the books, of course,” he said with a wink, “or swing at the end of a rope as a traitor and Song will swing right next to you. It will only be a minor inconvenience to find someone else to replace you.” General Ahn’s grip on Jiwon’s forearm, previously jovial, now became vice-like. Jiwon eyes met his and he saw in an instant the ferocity and the fervour that they contained. “We all have our role to play. Mine is to ensure that this city will outlive all of us a thousand times over, to give our best and brightest a chance to shine. Take a look around you,” Ahn said, his other hand sweeping a panorama around the room. “You’ve lived in District 25, albeit briefly. Decades of stagnation have slowed our engines of progress. Previous Generals used the Rebellion simply as a tool to control public attention. Anything could be blamed on them–from a bad crop yield to high unemployment. But we have finally been able to focus their efforts to genuinely help this City. Now, they are working with the rest of us, without even knowing it. They tear down buildings so that the construction industry can build them anew. Their actions allow us to increase military spending, and insurance securities have nearly tripled in value.”

Jiwon’s arm started to turn white from the strength of Ahn’s grip, his nails perilously close to piercing his skin. He stared deep into Jiwon’s eyes, unblinking, with a fanaticism he had never seen before, even amongst the rebels. And what chance had they against this man; all-powerful within the city walls and tyrannical to every last cell in his body? He dared not break his stare.

“I’m sure at this point you’re thinking that I’m not suited to this office,” his stare matched Jiwon’s, “but the truth is I am the only one that can manage this. Your predecessor, Dongwook, had that same, furious look when I asked him to take on this assignment. But he came to see my point of view by the end. If you don’t think you can follow his lead, then let me know now.”

Jiwon, listening to the pain in his body, considered the options before nodding slightly, his elbow protesting at the slightest movement.

“Well, that settles it,” Ahn stated, releasing his arm. “Your partner will be briefed and should make contact shortly. Until then,” Ahn paused, his face returning to one full of concern, “I’m sorry to have kept you so late!”

And with that he motioned Jiwon out the door as if he were a visiting work colleague. In some ways, what the General said made a sick kind of sense. Even though he had been trained to fight the Rebellion, they never really posed much of a threat. During his training and ever since he had moved out of the Sanatorium, the news media barely covered any of their actions. 

Outside of the office, he found the beta woman waiting for him. She took him back down the elevator and returned him to the waiting car. This time, she didn’t accompany him back to District 25. The tall man dropped him off a few blocks from the safehouse. 

He’d barely made it back inside his apartment when his comms unit crackled to life, Yunhyeong’s pale, sweaty face staring up at him from the screen.

“Infiltrate the rebellion?” He whispered. “They want us to… infiltrate the rebellion…”

Jiwon thought of Yunhyeong’s mate and his two kids. He’d never met them but he’d seen the pictures. He thought about what would happen to them if Yunhyeong swung as a traitor. 

“We don’t have a choice.”


End file.
